


Through Rose-Colored Glasses, Upside-Down

by Paper0wl



Series: Rod and Shield [12]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Supernatural, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Crossroad Deals, Disappearances, Gratuitous Doctor Who references, Gratuitous Stargate References, Murphy's Law, The Author Regrets Nothing, The Cake Is A Lie, secrets and lies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-18
Updated: 2015-04-09
Packaged: 2018-03-13 16:26:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 23,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3388433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Paper0wl/pseuds/Paper0wl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Darcy always said Jane's unhealthy devotion to Science was going to be the death of her. She just never meant it this literally. And while Jane and Kyria disappear to Asgard, the God of Lies is brought face to face with the many facets of a beautiful and terrible thing.</p>
<p>Or: What happens when the daughter of the devil crashes the script of Thor: The Dark World.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue: So Let it Be Written

**Author's Note:**

> Generally when I write a story, I have an idea of where it's going and where it fits in with the big picture. Then I made the mistake of doing R&S Phase 2 for NaNo'14. 
> 
> 60K+ of word vomit. Tangled plots. Increasingly schizophrenic characterization. No idea what happens after the (unedited) cluster of events that is CATWS. I took the cute little plot bunnies of "Phil doesn't die in Avengers because Supernatural OC" and "Supernatural doesn't turn into a giant angst fest because OC" and created a raging monster.
> 
> Still trying to edit the monster into something readable, consistent, and without gaping holes. Will probably finish taming R&S CATWS in time for Age of Ultron to spawn another monster.
> 
> Why did I ever start writing this in the first place? (Who needs to pass law school?) *claws at brain*
> 
> In other news, the opening of this fic was one of my favorites to write. *evil laugh*

***

If the Winchesters had to contend with demons in quantity, Kyria somehow managed to attract demonic _quality._ After all, it took an unusually bright demon to decide to use human authorities to kill the devil's daughter. 

It took a similar caliber of intelligent demon to target Sam and Dean when said daughter wasn't around to protect them. Kyria wasn't even on the _planet_ when Sam died. 

Dean only learned this when he called SHIELD on the verge of tears. Bela probably wasn't the best person to talk to in such a state, but she was Kyria's assistant and therefore answered any and all calls directed to her. Bela was under her own stress – SHIELD was feeling the strain of the post-New York microscope and Kyria had disappeared to Asgard. 

"Any idea when she'll be back?" he asked desperately. 

"She wasn't even supposed to _go,"_ Bela snapped. "I have half of SHIELD, the WSC, and assorted talking heads all wanting to talk to Orion and no way of knowing when she will return. Thor's family has incredibly poor timing." 

"Yeah," Dean agreed tonelessly, before issuing a lifeless _thanks_ and hanging up. 

Glassy, dead eyes stared accusingly at him. Dean hunched his shoulders and turned away, but his brother's unblinking gaze bored into his back. 

_You failed me. You were supposed to protect me._

His hands shook. He clenched them into fists, but that did nothing. Callused fingers trembled around the phone that couldn't do anything about the body that shouldn't be a body. Even if Kyria couldn't bring Sammy back, he needed to hear her detail exactly why he couldn't do anything. He needed to hear all the reasons why going to a crossroad was a bad idea. He needed to hear it from someone that wasn't him or Bobby. 

Because he couldn't call Bobby. Couldn't bring himself to admit how badly he had failed Sam. There was a whole hunter support system in place and Sam was dead because Dean was too stubborn and proud to ask for help. 

And without Kyria telling him all the reasons he couldn't, all he could think about was how he couldn't go on without his brother. Unhealthily codependent, look it up and there'd be a picture of Dean Winchester with his little brother. Except his little brother was dead now and it was his fault. 

Sam was Lucifer's vessel. Dean was Michael's vessel, and a Righteous Man to boot. (He didn't feel like a Righteous Man, maybe a Despondent Man, or a Hopeless Man, or a Fuck-Up Man.) A Righteous Man shedding blood in Hell was the first of the Sixty-Six Seals that needed to break in order to free Lucifer. If he went to the crossroad, he would be that Righteous Man in Hell. 

But if he didn't go, he would be the Broken Man, and if the next monster didn't kill him, or the next, the aching void where a girly-haired Sasquatch wasn't would have him eating a bullet. Suicides went to Hell anyway, didn't they? 

Kyria wasn't around to ask. 

Dean needed her to come back. She was the only one who might be able to keep him from doing anything stupid. 

He called Bela and was subjected to increasingly surly responses. She was the only person he spoke to other then the empty piece of meat that couldn't talk back anymore. After three days, he came to one inescapable conclusion: 

Kyria wasn't there to stop him. 

He did something stupid. 

***

Sam didn't know. 

Sam was alive and Dean had a year and _Sam didn't know._ No one did. No one knew that Sam had died. Except the demons. But they needed Sam alive anyway. 

Reason # _One more fucking way I fuck up every-fucking-thing:_ Sam had only died because the demons (read: Lilith) wanted Dean in Hell. And the surest way to get to Dean was through his brother. His _kid brother._ His _responsibility._

Sam died so that Dean would deal. And even though he _knew_ that, _knew_ that Sam wouldn't want this, would _never in a million years_ want this, he did it anyway. But Sam didn't know, so maybe he would be spared the soul-wrenching horrified pain he'd gone through with Dad's deal. Maybe it was cruel and wrong and not something he should keep from his brother, but Dean couldn't bring himself to tell Sam the truth. Let Sam have an ordinary year, let him not freak out and stress and worry. Without Kyria there was no chance of getting out of his deal. But maybe . . . maybe he could do one last thing for Sam before his time was up. 

Kyria had given them a knife that killed demons. If he could find Lilith and kill her before the year was over, then there would be no Sixty-Sixth Seal. Without that final seal to break, Satan would stay in his box and not threaten Sam. And then maybe this wouldn't have been for nothing. 

Dean had one year. He would use it to cheat Hell of its prize. 

***

He explained it as solving the problem before it started, because with Kyria missing, Lilith was sure to step up her game. 

Sam bought it. So did Bobby. 

The hunters' network was suddenly awash with people finding out everything they could on what made a man Righteous, looking for demonic omens, trying to get on the First Demon. And Dean was right there with his guilty secret, his steadily ticking countdown, working on denying Hell this one last thing. 

It couldn't be all Lilith, all the time. They did regular hunts too. To keep things normal. Not that there was anything normal about getting hit by a car on the tenth floor or being ripped apart by a dog in a diner restroom. The case _seemed_ like assholes getting what was coming to them, but Sam swore the vics were reformed. 

The third vic was still alive when they found him. Well, technically, _he_ found _them,_ running out in front of their car. Still. Semantics. They left the guy in a salt circle while Sam went to check out the barn and Dean went to the bar. Between having to save assholes from ghosts and not telling Sam he was on a deadline, he could drink _and_ investigate. Two birds, one stone and all that jazz. 

The bartender was cute. And his life was shit. So when she asked, he answered. 

"You ever, uh . . . you ever do something behind someone's back because you had to?" 

"Now you feel bad?" she guessed. "Well, Dean, if you had to, why feel guilty? That doesn't make sense." 

"Hmm." 

_Because I'm going to die. Because Sam doesn't know. Because I've lived with the pain of knowing someone dealt for me and I wish I could spare my brother that pain. Because I only did it because I'm a selfish failure. Because I screwed up Sam's life more than if I'd just let him die._

They clinked glasses and Dean managed a smile. "Well, you know, we don't have enough room for the worms if we pop that can, sister." 

The bartender, Mia, encouraged him to slow his drinking. "Yeah, well, I'm off in an hour. So don't pass out on me." 

"Well, then I think I'll switch to beer." 

She smiled. "Good choice." 

***

He never made it to his date. Instead of a cute bartender he got chained to a chair, presumably in the barn, with an overly ornate throne and funky looking statues. 

Dean was not impressed with the witness abilities of Mr. Just Got Out of Prison for Murder. "Really, Warren? All you noticed were the symbols?" 

And just like that the throne was occupied. "Quit squirming, Mr. Winchester. They're Houdini-proof. Now, you want to talk charges, or . . ." 

Was this guy fucking kidding? "You want to sentence me to death? Seriously? My ticket's already punched. Or did you not notice the lien on my soul?" 

Under different circumstances, Dean might have been impressed by his ability to shock a – whatever this guy was. He should really work on finding that out. Right after he got out of here. 

The guy stared at him, trying to read Dean's whole life with his eyes. 

"Dude, if you're gonna go the eye-sex route, you could at least buy me a drink first. I was _just_ at a bar. Where you grabbed me from in fact. Thanks for that by the way." 

"I've never done that before," the would-be judge, jury, and executioner said in shock. 

"Done what? Made a mistake? Happens to the best of us." 

"Just a moment." 

And the guy vanished. Great. And he was right about not being able to escape from the chains. Seriously what the fuck. Dean needed to start carrying a full set of lock picks on him at all times. In the year he had left. Maybe less if this kinda thing kept up. Fucking hell. Oh, look what he did there. Hehe. Fuck. This was not the sort of thing he could handle drunk. Actually, he didn't really think he wanted to handle it sober either. Maybe he should just try not to handle it at all. Maybe he should just pray really hard that Kyria got back before his time was up. 

Yeah, right. Among other things, he'd looked up the Norse gods. Sure she was good, but he wouldn't bet on her against the whole damn pantheon. A planet full of god-like aliens with very little reason to like Kyria. Because Kyria wasn't the type to go incommunicado. If she was radio-silent it was because she _couldn't_ get back. So, yeah, Dean was screwed six ways to Sunday. 

But that wasn't helping currently. Who the fuck had kidnapped him? Bald, with a fancy staff and gold collar, weird statues and hieroglyphs, obsessed with death. 

Nope. Got nothing. 

Um, wait, hieroglyphs. Sam had been fascinated by the Pyramids as a kid. Okay, so Egyptian. Probably a pagan god. Anubis was their death god, right? But wasn't he a jackal? Aside from Kujo's ghost, nothing about this case involved anything remotely dog-like. What were the other gods? 

Dean was drawing a blank. Lately his focus had been demons and _Norse_ gods, not Egyptian. He didn't think he'd ever run into anything Egyptian. Except that girl the year before Sam disappeared to California. Michelle? Yeah, she was Egyptian. 

Wasn't there some show about Egyptian aliens? Yeah, with spaceships, a hot military chick, and MacGyver. He'd actually watched more than a few episodes of that on cheap motel TVs. Who were the bad guys? Uh . . . Apophis, no idea what he was the god of; Ra, the sun god, a lot of cultures had a sun god, actually; Anubis was a creepy fuck, but he'd already ruled him out; um, Horus? Wasn't he a hawk? Cronus wasn't Egyptian. And those little grey squids bore no resemblance whatsoever to the _real_ Thor. 

There had to be more Egyptian bad guys on the show. Even the non-Egyptians used Egyptian designs! Oh, Daniel's girlfriends. Cher? No that was the wife, not the wife's snake. Snakes were creepy. The archeologist girlfriend. Sirius? No, that was Harry Potter. Osiris! Osiris and Isis. Osiris judged the dead and Isis was his wife. 

Okay. So. Osiris. What the fuck did Osiris want with him? _Stargate's_ Osiris was way hotter than the real one. In a toss-up between homicidal gods, he would pick the hot one every time. 

And look, perfect timing – Osiris was back. 

"What was that about?" Dean demanded. 

"I do not wish to be disturbed while I determine what went wrong this time." 

Disturbed? Who would – oh, fuck. Sam. "What did you do to him?!" 

"Nothing permanent. There is no guilt in his heart." 

"So you're attracted to guilt, then? That's your deah – uh, game, is it, Osiris?" Nope, not a deal. Deals were bad. Deals were what started all of this in the first place. A deal he had _agreed_ to, even sought out, but still a bad idea. 

"So you figured out who I am? And yes, guilt is my 'game' as you say. If the guilt in your heart weighs more than a feather. _I_ don't judge you – you do. But you, I think, are a special case." 

Dean snorted. He couldn't help himself. "Special. Right. Everyone says that. Everyone is interested in me because I'm 'special.' Good for me. I'm so special people wait in line to kill me." 

"All that guilt you feel – about _saving_ a life. About the death that is coming to you. You, Mr. Winchester, are a very rare bird. Mine, but not. I've never encountered one such before." 

"Good for you. And they say you can't teach an old dog new tricks. How old are you, anyway? It's not polite to ask a lady her age, so I can't ask Kyria, even though she's the oldest person I know." Sue him. Snark was a defense mechanism he fell back on when threatened. Chained to a chair with a pagan god who imposed death sentences made him feel threatened, "Rare bird" or not. 

"Kyria? I'm not familiar with a goddess of that name." 

"Cause she's not a goddess. She's, uh, what was the word? Nephilim, that's it." 

Osiris scowled. "Christians. Think they're so great because they're popular. Hmph. Give it another few millennia and they'll be like the rest of us. I thought the nephilim had died out, though." 

"Last I heard, she's still alive. Pretty sure Asgard's pissed at her, but she's alive. How that's possible when she's friends with homicidal Loki, and _he_ has custody of tried-to-take-over-the-world Loki, I really don't know. Hey, that's an idea. Get the Lokis to go to Asgard and bring her back. Lilith can suck it then!" He had to _find_ the Lokis first. Kyria's Loki was reputedly very difficult to reach. And taking New York Loki back to the people that drove him to go off the deep end in the first place might not be such a good idea. And Asgard might not be any more willing to let Kyria go than they were when she went there a month ago. And Kyria might not even be able to take from Lilith a contract the demon wanted so much. It was still better than nothing though. 

The Egyptian god froze. It was almost comical – you know, if it wasn't for the whole 'attempting to kill him' thing. 

"You speak of the Morningstar's heir." 

"Yeah? I don't know any other Kyrias. It isn't a common name. Kyria – Morningstar, Orion, Lux – whatever the name, it's the same girl." 

"You know the Morningstar." 

"Didn't I just say that? Did you not hear me or something?" 

"You know the Morningstar and yet you made such a deal?" 

Dean grimaced. "Yeah, well, it wasn't my best move, that's for sure. Why else would I feel so fucking guilty about it?" 

Osiris narrowed his eyes. Dean swallowed nervously. "I cannot judge you," Osiris said finally. 

"Uh . . ." 

Before Dean could react, the god, the statues, and the chains were gone. 

"Okay. Cause that's helpful." 

"Dean!" 

He turned involuntarily. "Sam. You're okay? Osiris didn't do any hocus-pocus shit on you did he?" 

"On me? Dean, I thought he was going after you!" Sam exclaimed in worry. 

"He was. Then he wasn't." 

"How do you stop a god?" 

"Uh, I don't actually know. I just talked to him." 

_"You_ talked down a homicidal god, Dean?" 

"Why are you saying that like it's the weirdest thing you ever heard?" 

"Because you're _you,_ Dean. You open your mouth and things want to kill you _more,_ not _less."_

"Okay, that's not completely inaccurate, I'll admit." 

"So what really happened?" 

"Uh, I think Osiris freaked when I mentioned Kyria." 

It wasn't a complete lie. So, he hadn't learned anything from Osiris about keeping guilt-inducing secrets from his brother. Sue him. 

***

They kept hunting. Both the regular stuff and the Lilith stuff. And by regular, he actually meant married witches in desperate need of a proper therapist, far too many psychics than was good for his mental health, and a last Christmas made depressing by the seeming death of the only billionaire superhero who showed proper appreciation of his baby. 

Then Stark was back and Kyria still wasn't. 

In between helping a girl rescue her dad from Vetalas and Sam facing off with yet another creepily homicidal clown (apparently those were a thing now), Dean added "Find Loki(s)" to the network's To-Do list. Because Loki (either one) could probably go to Asgard and find Kyria, and then Kyria could find Lilith. At least that's how he explained it when asked. 

(He did NOT talk about the case in Seattle. He just _didn't._ His mental health – bad as it was – could only take so much.) 

Sam was proud of him for not trying to avoid Kyria like a lot of other hunters. Dean managed a grimacing smile and tried not to let guilt curdle his appetite too much. Sam would notice if he suddenly wasn't hungry. 

Getting drunk in order to spot a ghost probably wasn't the best thing to do with a guilty conscience and a whooper of a secret, but Garth made for a surprisingly good conversation distraction and Dean successfully avoided spilling the beans. 

It got harder as the months crept by with nothing but more demons, false leads on Lilith, dead hunters, dead civilians, false leads on the Lokis, and still no word from Asgard. SHIELD was distinctly no help on that front because apparently their expert on Asgardian science was missing too, their _other_ expert was kinda crazy and didn't have a clue during his lucid moments, and the only other person who worked with the missing expert didn't actually know how any of it worked. 

Dean drank more and joked less. Sam clearly knew something was wrong, but Dean was too pig-headishly stubborn to admit what a fuck-up he was. And the longer it went on, the harder it was to admit. How did he tell his brother that he did something he knew was a bad idea, that Sam would not have agreed with, and in two and a half months he was going to die and cause even more problems? 

It put a strain on their relationship despite Dean's best efforts to compensate. Maybe this was just one of those things you couldn't compensate for. "I screwed up your life because I'm too fucked-up to go on without you." Nice healthy co-dependency. A remnant of the A-plus parenting methods of the guy who brought him "save your brother or kill him." 

Well, Dean saved him all right. The very same way Dad had saved him. And Dean was the one leaving Sam to deal with the consequences if things didn't look up before the clock ran out. 

Yep. He was totally screwed. They both were. And it was his fault. 

***

Dean got increasingly jumpy as time wound down. Probably because he had less than a week left when they finally heard that Lilith was terrifying hapless suburbanites in New Harmony, Indiana. He couldn't get Sam or Bobby to let him fight the bitch alone without explaining that he was dead anyway. Not only did he _really_ not want to admit that after a year of successfully avoiding the subject, he wasn't entirely convinced they would let him go alone anyway. 

So he had a brother and father-figure to protect, a majorly powerful demon-bitch to kill, and, oh, look, just under thirty-six hours to do it all. Wasn't he just lucky like that? 

In thirty-six hours, barring a fucking _miracle,_ he was going to be dead. How likely was it that Lilith wouldn't mention that to Sam on this little charge of the Light Brigade? He'd gotten fucking lucky that no little black-eyed shit had said anything in Sam's hearing this year. Odds were good that Sam was going to find out about the deal just in time for it to come due. 

He was a fucking shitty brother. All year. He had _all year_ to confess. And now he was out of time. Literally. Every movement of the clock counted down to his death and he _still hadn't told Sam._ Fuck. 

_Screw you, Osiris! I know I'm fucking guilt-ridden! I didn't need you to fucking spell it out!_

He couldn't do this. He just couldn't. Tell, don't tell. He was screwed either way. And Sam was going to hate him. For making the deal and for keeping it secret. 

Shit. And he was having a fucking _panic attack_ in Bobby's bathroom. Nope, nothing suspicious about that. Nothing at all. 

There was a knock on the door. "Dean? You ready yet? Bobby says he'll give the distributor cap back." 

"Give me a minute," he managed to choke out mostly normally. Like a minute was going to do a fucking thing. He was caught between _telling Sam_ and _leaving Sam in peace,_ even though Lilith, dead or alive, would much prefer Sam in _pieces_ (but alive), and there was no answer. 

Dean splashed water on his face. "I can do this. I have to do this. For Sam." His whole life was for Sam; he wasn't going to stop now. "I will do this –” 

The door burst open and he blinked up in surprise. 

"Eleanor made dinner," Gabriel announced. 

Loki frowned. "I'm not done yet." 

"It's _Supernatural._ The _series_ isn't done yet. And besides knowing the characters, we live with the authors. One of whom has tentacles and a temper if we let her food get cold. C'mon." 

With one last lingering look, Loki marked his place in _No Rest for the Wicked_ and put the book down to follow the archangel downstairs.


	2. Blame the Mayans

If it wasn’t for the fact that Tony would take it as an excuse to annoy her for the whole eight hours, Kyria might have gone for a Stark Industries plane. She wasn't comfortable flying commercial. 

For all that Fury had sent her literally all over the world to demon-proof all of SHIELD’s bases (even the ones she didn’t technically have the clearance to know about), SHIELD had its own fleet of planes and usually only sent agents on public flights for undercover missions. 

Except, of course, when a single agent was going abroad at the request of a (semi) outside party. One agent generally did not warrant her own plane. _Two_ agents might have, but Clint had (finally) been authorized for a mission without a babysitter. As suspicious as the timing was, she thought it was far past time Clint lost his post-Loki leash. 

Even if it left her facing the real worry of accidentally shorting out the electrical instrumentation that kept the plane full of innocent, oblivious civilians in the air. 

Fury just gave her an arched look and noted her uncanny ability to keep things from going to shit too quickly. In other words, a plane was a plane, and she was expected to not prevent the plane she was on from arriving at its destination in one piece. Typical, helpful, reassuring Fury. 

Which left her stuck in a flying tin can for eight hours surrounded by hapless civilians. Wi-Fi was her only saving grace. That and a backlog of relatively minor issues that had been piling up. The top of the list being Agent Philip Not-Dead Coulson. 

Talking down an explodable man at a public train station was a great way to end up on YouTube. Not so great when he was (had been) officially considered “dead” by anyone with less than a SHIELD Level Seven Security Clearance. As good as they were, the Tech Twins couldn’t stop something they didn’t know about. Especially when they’d been sulking about the whole Skye business. 

First, the girl had hacked SHIELD. Had she been after any of the things Ash and Charlie worked on, they insisted they could have found her and shut her down. As it was, Phil needed them to help back-trace the hack. To make matters worse, _Phil_ had recruited the remarkable hacker, while the Twins gave him the evil eye. 

So now Phil had the mobile response team he’d been talking about for years, and the Tech Twins _didn’t_ have the hacking prodigy (who was a security risk and therefore wasn't cleared to know about things that didn’t technically exist), and Kyria was fielding complaints from hunters who were getting their toes stepped on because supernatural problems were getting mixed with some of the alien and/or weird science variety. The year and a half after a highly televised attempted alien invasion made for some _interesting_ issues, of which the explodable man was only one of the most recent. 

And as useful as it was to have eight hours of mandated downtime to keep the Twins from spamming Phil’s inbox and juggle yet another round of communications from various parties – assorted non-humans trying to adapt to hunters and SHIELD protocols, Ellen worrying about Jo’s new roommate, Dean fretting over his eight-month-old daughter being in college, etc. – it was still a slow, crowded tin can and Kyria kept waiting for one of the passengers to flash her back eyes. 

That was the sort of thing that happened to her, after all. 

If she actually thought it would get her more than just a headache, she would pin down Gabriel one day and get him to teach her how to teleport. Sorry, _fly._ Of course, that only worked if he _answered his phone._ Or responded to prayers, or did pretty much _anything_ besides annoy her to no end. Kyria had heard nothing from him since he disappeared with Loki. She would be more worried about that fact if he didn’t do that sort of thing _all the time._ To say Fury was displeased the leader of the alien invasion of New York was on planet and he could not monitor the situation was comparable to saying he was displeased the World Security Council had gone over his head to try to nuke New York City. That is to say, “displeased” did not begin to cover the sheer magnitude of the situation. 

In a way, Kyria was almost glad to have to deal with the (ongoing, pressing-but-not-urgent) Lilith Crisis; it kept her on the move and away from the director’s immediate ire. Although if she ever got a secure moment with the Director, she wanted to hear what was behind that ridiculous Tahiti nonsense. Like Coulson would ever agree to take _vacation._ Please. 

And with no discernable leads on where the first demon was or what she was doing (beyond the obvious), Kyria had no reason not to travel across the Atlantic to help Drs. Selvig and Foster research the spacial anomalies caused by the imminent convergence. In fact, given that Kyria was the recognized expert in Alien Energy Science, she had many reasons to go to assist them. Especially since Jane, like most of the people associated with their group, hadn’t taken any back-up with her in case of unforeseen problems (because Tony quickly lost interest in this sort of highly theoretical science and SHIELD was still a bureaucratic swirl of jack-booted thugs). 

Perfectly valid issues, but in Kyria’s experience, unforeseen problems had a habit of making themselves seen when least convenient. A localized region where the laws of physics were not ironclad? Yeah, nothing could possibly go wrong there. She wondered how long it would take Murphy to come knocking this time. 

The phone call came just after clearing customs. 

“What do you mean Jane disappeared?!” 

***

Traffic getting out of Heathrow was a nightmare. Made worse by the presence of the anomaly Jane had been here to study in the first place. 

She didn't remember the last convergence being this much of a nuisance. Sure she had been a lot younger and considerably more distracted with running for her life from all and sundry, but even then, there was no way she could have missed _this_ level of irritant. 

There was a dizzying pull at the edge of her senses which she attributed to the convergence. In-between fighting the feeling she was driving on the wrong side of the road and answering increasingly worried calls from Darcy, Kyria cursed the Mayans, the planets, the convergence, and the masses of people who misinterpreted it all. 

The realms of the universe were _not_ supposed to be this close and Kyria had the misfortune of being one of the few who could hear it complain. Her skin felt tight and itchy and in the back of her head she could hear an echoing resonance that probably would have irritated her more had she not gotten used to tuning out the extra heartbeat that still pulsed at the edge of her awareness. 

That wasn't to say it wasn't highly annoying. The closer she got, the more it felt like her skin was being scraped raw. Some days she really hated being the Alien Energy Expert. The only upside was that as close as she was to the locus of the convergence, she could use as much power as necessary and not accidentally signal the Choir. 

Then again, Michael could be within arms distance of her and she wouldn't notice in the middle of the convergence. Not that Michael – or any member of the winged contingent – was even remotely likely to put in an appearance near the event, given their "hands-off" policy. Granted, said policy only applied where it didn't hinder their view of what "should" be, so if anyone upstairs caught a hint of the Morningstar Abomination, they would likely move Heaven and Earth to get at her, regardless. 

According to Joshua, who was more inclined to gossip than either his title or demeanor suggested, Heaven had finally caught on to the fact that their little Apocalypse plans were going belly-up. Probably because Lilith was topside and essentially floundering. Righteous Men weren't exactly thick on the ground, and Michael couldn't end Lucifer if the seals weren't breaking. So Heaven was partially, chaotically mobilized – because angels without clear, explicit orders were problems waiting in the wings – and still clueless as to what had gone wrong. 

The longer it took the Heavenly Choir to realize _she_ was the reason their plans weren't working, the happier she'd be. Truthfully, she'd be perfectly content if they _never_ caught on, but there was no getting around the fact that they were going to wise up sooner or later, unfortunately. Hunting Lilith while avoiding being hunted by angelic assassins was _not_ something she was looking forward to. 

Although, it was oddly reminiscent of her state of affairs last time the realms aligned. Only difference was this time she was trying to _catch_ a demon and had more than just one person at her side. (And that one was dead. That was a relatively recent thing too, if longer ago than the day an archer, a demon, and a fugitive walked into a nuclear power plant.) 

But morbid future musings and depressing past recollections weren't going to help Jane, so Kyria pushed those thoughts aside, and tried to ignore the noxious buzz of the tears the convergence was ripping in the fabric of reality in order to focus on the matter(s) at hand. Like parking the rental without hitting anything and investigating the Case of the Missing Astrophysicist. 

"What happened?" she asked bluntly. 

"Eric was setting up his monitoring doodads while Ian and I played with the weird gravity in the stairwell. Jane was with us, but then I turned around and she wasn't there. I thought she just wandered off 'cause her science thingy was gone too, but then she wasn't answering her phone and Eric said he hadn't seen her, and I didn't want to call the police because I didn't actually think they'd be any help with this stuff, and I didn't want to call Shield because while we think you're cool, Eric has this thing with them letting Thor's crazy brother get him, and Jane still has a grudge about them stealing her research, and I haven't forgiven them for stealing my iPod that time, and you were already on your way here so Eric thought maybe we could just wait for you, 'cause you are kinda the closest thing we have to an expert anyway, but I'm really freaking out here because it's been almost three hours and Jane doesn't just disappear. Not when she could be doing Science." 

Kyria was impressed despite her headache. "The last time I heard anyone say that much without breathing, Chuck had just announced he was going to publish more _Supernatural_ books. I never thought anyone could out-babble Becky." 

Darcy responded with a _look_ last seen aimed at Anthony Edward Stark by one Virginia Potts. 

"Jane. Missing. Focus." 

"Yeah. I got that. The holes are kinda giving me a headache and making it hard to focus." 

Eric perked up at that, looking less worried and guilty, and asked her a great many technical questions about her reaction to the convergence, which she mostly ignored. Same as she ignored the confused questions from the new intern about who exactly she was. Darcy introduced her as "a SHIELD expert, one of the less light-fingered, annoying ones. She's actually pretty cool. I mean, she's BFFs with Agent iPod Thief and the Cyborg Cyclops, but I don't usually hold that against her." 

This didn't really clarify anything for the rather hapless intern. "Who? Why do we need an expert on shields?" 

Kyria sighed, rubbing her aching head in a futile effort to ease the discordant hum. "Not shields, SHIELD. You know, the Battle of New York?" 

Everyone knew the Battle of New York. Even overly enthusiastic British science interns. "Have you met Tony Stark?" 

"Yes, unfortunately." If he wasn't covering up something that was arguably PTSD, or _in_ conveniently forgetting he had people he could ask for help (if he wasn't too stubbornly proud), he was calling at all hours with questions or comments about Alien Energy, or trying to lure her somewhere where JARVIS could take more scans of her. But she wasn't getting into that with someone who didn't know she was either Orion or Morningstar, and certainly not when every cell in her body shook with the proximity of the tears. 

Last time she hadn't gotten anyway where _near_ this close to the epicenter. 

"Last time?" 

Whoops. Eric had a speculative gleam in his eyes. "Can you show me what you were looking at when Jane disappeared?" she asked, before he could ask anything else about The Convergence And Her. 

***

The non-scientists (an intern, a former intern, and three kids) had been fascinated by a localized gravitational anomaly. Eric had been setting up stakes around the site to record and prevent such anomalies. It was collectively agreed that Jane had probably tracked down the largest anomaly, a theory supported by the lack of anomaly tracking device, last seen in Jane's possession. 

So theoretically all they needed to do was find the largest anomaly and hope whatever was on the other side wasn't inimical to human life. 

Unfortunately, there was no convenient replacement for the device Jane had taken; it took the better part of an hour to rig up something comparable. During which time, unfortunately, local police got it into their heads to investigate activity at the (supposedly) abandoned warehouse and Kyria had to flash her SHIELD credentials to get them out of her hair. 

Also unfortunate was Kyria doubling over to splatter airline lunch all over the floor as soon as they finally located said largest anomaly. Yes, she didn't like the convergence. This close, it was worse than being in a car driven by Nat, doing evasive maneuvers, while suffering from a particularly nauseating drug. 

It happened. Kyria probably would have died in Budapest if she'd been properly human. It wasn't her fondest memory. An uninformed person might have thought that after that, anything else would seem like a walk in the park. But apparently being Morningstar meant being cursed with an “interesting” life. Like, for example, attempting to be a covert celebrity superhero with a whole herd of ninja cats to keep in the bag. That was _super_ fun. 

On the plus side, however, they found Jane laying on the floor right at the epicenter. Darcy swore up and down that she had looked down that hallway, so coupled with the suspiciously convenient reappearance of the formerly missing astrophysicist, and the ill-repute of it having been the _biggest_ anomaly, it was a safe bet there was something of a problematic nature on the other side. 

Still, they had Jane back, and while she woke up thinking just a few minutes had passed, she seemed fine. 

Until the rain started. 

There was a rather unusual downpour with a perfect rain-free circle. And Jane just _happened_ to be at the precise center of the circle that moved with her. Yeah, Murphy was at it again. But he hadn't stacked the deck, because while Kyria tried to clear her head of the cosmic interference enough to get a read on what was up with Jane, and Eric tried to reconfigure his instruments to do the same, Thor showed up. Which explained the oddly structured energy burst that preceded the rain 

"I guess they fixed the Bifrost," Kyria noted absently as the intern gaped and Thor stopped the rain without lifting a finger. 

Jane's little trip down the rabbit-hole apparently hid her from the sight of Asgard's watchman, sending her boyfriend running in worry. 

"Wait, so Mime Doll can see her in the shower? That's so deep into major creeper territory, right there," Darcy exclaimed, appalled. 

"Heimdall is an honorable warrior," Thor corrected. "He would not watch for nefarious purposes." 

Ian managed to recover his tongue enough to ask, "You guys know _Thor?"_

"Know him? We made first contact," Darcy said proudly. "With a van, technically – totally Jane's fault, by the way – but it was still first contact. And _then_ I tased him." 

Clearly the intern was in good company because he started fanboy-babbling a mile a minute. Eric smacked one of his handheld devices a few times while waving it over Jane, to insistent beeping and the worsening of Kyria's headache. 

Jane seemed to find it as annoying as Kyria did, though for very different reasons. "Do you really have to do that now? Thor just got here!" Eric just frowned at the loudly beeping device and got closer. "Can you just _stop that?!"_ she exclaimed, grabbing for the device. 

Her hand closed on nothing because the device, the person holding it, and the others standing beside her were all thrown back as a wave of red light burst from Jane. 

Kyria stared, her headache suddenly the least of her concerns. Aside from Jane, who was the source of the wave, she was the only one not moved by the energy. Probably because she had some distance from Jane at the time. Even Thor had been knocked back, although he at least was still on his feet. 

"What the absolute fuck?" Darcy said, climbing back to her feet. 

"That felt like a saner, more malevolent version of the Tesseract," Kyria noted, helping Eric to his feet. 

"The Tesseract?" Thor repeated in alarm. 

"What just happened?" Jane asked in confusion as Thor pulled her upright. 

"I do not know," the alien prince replied. "I must take you to our healers. If this is related to the Tesseract, they may know of a solution. Will you not accompany us, Lady Orion?" 

"What?" Kyria asked, at the same time the intern goggled, "Orion?!" 

"You are more knowledgeable about this than I, and may be of more use to the healers in identifying the source of this ailment." 

"Uh." Offers to visit alien worlds didn't come every day, and there wasn't a chance would she be able to sit and wait quietly on Earth when Jane was infected with something resembling Tesseract energy. Although, given her luck, Lilith would probably decide to surface while Kyria was gone. Then again, there was a reason she'd networked the hunters. Other people could handle Lilith-watch for a day or two. 

She hoped. 

"Sure. Hey, Darcy, please let SHIELD I'm going to be out of range for a few days." 

Thor offered her his other arm. "Hold on." 

Kyria wasn't sure if the Bifrost descended on them, or if they rose up to the Bifrost. Either way, the rainbow swirl of energies was highly ordered and strangely soothing against the cacophonic chaos of the convergence. 

***

Darcy stared at the smoldering imprint branded into the pavement. "Holy shit." It was identical to the one from New Mexico. Well, it _should_ be – it was the same Rainbow Bridge, after all. Well, a fixed version of the same bridge. Same diff. "Well, he sure didn't stay long." 

"That was Thor!" 

She shot the intern an exasperated smile. "Yeah. Pretty sure we already covered that." 

"You guys know Thor!" 

"And that too." 

"Was that really Orion?" 

"Yes, it was, but don't spread it around – she's not out of the superhero closet, yet, and doesn't have any plans to be. Also, she's got really scary friends – and is pretty badass-ily scary herself – so if you out her, you better have a really good place to hide. Like the moon or something." 

"What? No! I – just – this is _brilliant!"_

Darcy laughed. Oh to be that naive again. Three years of Jane, aliens, men in black, more aliens, Tony Stark, and alien-based monsters going _bump_ in the night had made her kinda jaded about this sort of thing. At least she got her degree finished, all aliens, government protection details, and campus crashing science/Army showdowns aside. "Yeah, well, you got lucky. When aliens invaded _my_ intern gig, we got a fire-breathing deathbot. You just got the superhero celebrities. And if you'll give me a minute, maybe go help Eric with his anti-gravanomaly thingies, I gotta go call Kyria's sadistic secretary – sorry, _personal assistant._ Never thought I'd say this, but some days I kinda miss dealing with Agent iPod Thief."


	3. Intergalactic Bullsh - uh, Politics

After standing at the edge of the convergence unraveling reality as they knew it, the structured tranquility of the Bifrost and Asgard felt like a balm on her very being. Even Jane was in Astrophysicist Heaven, being on another planet and all. All of her theories were being validated, _and_ she was impressing the advanced alien healers. 

Then Odin stormed in. 

At least, Kyria assumed he was Odin, seeing how all the healers deferred to the man, and he had an eye patch, and he was on familiar, yet authoritative terms with Thor. 

Then he insulted Jane. 

"She does not belong here in Asgard any more than a goat belongs at a banquet table." 

"I should think a king would have better manners than such a goat," Kyria countered icily smooth as Jane sat up in affront. 

The scientist blinked. "King? So this is –" 

"Odin. King of Asgard. Protector of the Nine Realms," the man in question replied tersely. "You would do well to display such etiquette yourself, mortal." 

Lacking a mirror, Kyria could not say just how predatory her smile was, although she knew it could not be remotely pleasant. Following up the Migraine From Hell with Endangered Friend and Arrogant Ass was not something engineered to have her be conciliatory. "Firstly, you just named yourself as Protector of the _Nine_ Realms, of which Midgard is one. So when your son brings before you a problem that threatens one of those you claim to protect, maybe you should try to listen before wantonly dismissing it as irrelevant. Secondly, open your eye to see what it is that is before you – Jane may be mortal, but I most assuredly am not." 

She went for showy. Over the top effects were sure to get attention from arrogant alien kings. Or at least they made it harder to be ignored. And being ignored was not an option when Jane's life was potentially at risk. 

In Kyria's case, "showy" meant summoning forth the wings she had never before consciously manifested. Gabriel had given her a fifteen-minute crash course right before her life came under massive scrutiny and she was a quick learner when pressed. (A deep black twenty-foot wingspan that threatened to destroy her well-crafted privacy? Definitely counted as pressed.) Said wingspan unfolding from her back in a shower of lightning sparks counted as very showy indeed. 

The healers drew back, the guards' hands hovered near their weapons, and Odin gave her a stony glare. 

Fury had given her worse. And she actually _answered_ to Fury. 

"Sentinel," Odin said coldly. "I did not think your kind could leave the realm to which your existence was tethered." 

"Not a sentinel," she correctly just as icily. "That was my father. And _he_ was the leader of the Fallen, powerful enough to create a whole new planar anchor. I am not bound by either." 

His eye narrowed. "Morningstar." 

Her smile showed a great deal of teeth. "You've heard of us." Her skin crawled at grouping herself with her father, but there was _no way_ she was going to take his casual arrogance lying down when it was keeping Jane from getting the help she needed. If shock tactics were what it took, then that was what she would do. "Admittedly, I cut all ties with my father, but if I were so inclined to steep myself in sulfur and suffering, I could be on the throne within the day." 

Odin's gaze shifted sharply to his son. "Do you _know_ what you have brought among us?" 

Points to Thor for not quailing. Then again, he had grown up with Odin as a father, and had already demonstrated a willingness to go around his orders – allowing Gabriel to keep Loki away from Asgard with only a token protest, for one outstanding example. "Lady Kyria fought beside me when the Chitauri attempted to gain a hold on Midgard. She has proven herself an honorable comrade and that is what I judge her by; I know better than to judge one solely upon the actions of their blood." 

And it came back to Loki. What was it Bobby always said? "Family don't end in blood"? Whatever Loki did, however he had been born, Thor still firmly held the trickster as his brother. Kyria hoped Gabriel would be able to get through to the conflicted being, because if he couldn't, she feared Loki would consume himself. 

"The Sentinels will not have me, and I will not have the Defilers," Kyria explained in a deceptively mild tone, conceding the use of the Asgardian terminology so as to not prematurely alienate the king over something relatively unimportant. "As standing alone failed to achieve anything for me but pain, I stand with the mortals of Midgard, against the appetites of the Twisted, though many chose to stand with me; against the deprivations of my father's brood, who oscillate between thinking me weak and thinking me traitor; against the apathetic machinations of the kin he broke with, many of whom seem to think mortals are but puppets on a string; and against any other who would think to threaten the ones I _actually_ protect. Do not think to look upon me and see my father – you would not want me for an enemy." 

A tension-laden silence descended upon the room as the Aesir waited upon their king's response to the barely-gilded threat. 

"Very well," Odin replied. It was with no little relief that the battle-readiness drained from the room. "I will reserve judgment for now. Do not give my son reason to regret naming you comrade-in-arms. Now, what ails the mortal so that it demanded the attention of Asgard?" 

"She has been infected by an energy, Father. She vanished from Heimdall's vision and when she returned, a red energy manifested itself when she was distressed." 

"A red energy? Can you not be more detailed than that?" Yep, Odin was irritated. At least Kyria wasn't the only one. If for vastly different reasons. 

"It felt like a saner, more malevolent form of the energy held by the Tesseract," Kyria offered, repeating her earlier description. Attention returned to her. "Whereas the Tesseract had many, conflicting voices, from the brief glimpse I had of this, it had only one, and that one was born of destruction." 

"You had occasion to join with the Tesseract?" Odin questioned suspiciously. 

"It was the best method offered to me to keep another of our battle companions from plummeting to his death after risking much to save us all." Not that the nuke would have killed her, even if it had exploded beside her. But that hardly invalidated the sacrifice Stark had offered, or her instinctive decision to halt his fall. 

"And you _released_ it?" the king pressed. 

She gave a careless shrug. "It gave me a headache." Now was not the time to wonder about his reaction or the Tesseract's pre-Earth history. Now was _what is wrong with Jane and how do we fix it?_

Looking thoughtful, Odin turned to Jane. "May I?" 

Looking to Thor and Kyria for guidance, Jane nodded. 

The king took hold of her hand and ran a hand over her arm. Her arm glowed red. Odin looked disturbed. "It's impossible." 

"I've learned to limit my use of that word," Kyria noted idly. 

"Come with me." 

***

Stories conflicted over whether the energy in Jane "predated the universe" or was created by a particularly demented Dark Elf. Kyria figured she had tested the bounds of Odin's patience enough for one day and declined to point out the discrepancy. She supposed it was also possible that Malekith was ridiculously old at the time of his defeat – access to unusual energies was known to increase lifespan, after all. And Kyria was not above dropping mention of the fact that she'd been alive five thousand years ago when Odin's dad had defeated Malekith's minions. And yes, that did have a nice alliterative ring to it. The whole _Dark_ Elves seeking to return the universe to _darkness_ on the other hand was a flagrant example of either unimaginative or extraordinarily coincidental naming. Possibly prophetic naming, but she didn't know if that was a thing or not. 

Regardless, Jane had the Aether, the Aether could destroy the universe, the Aether _would_ kill Jane before long, and if any Dark Elves survived, they would want the Aether, and its vessel. 

The first two points were mere facts, unavoidable and uncontestable. Asgard, its king and healers could do nothing about the third, and seemed to have an ostrich perspective on the fourth. 

Kyria was not impressed. 

The Asgardians weren't sure whether to be impressed or frightened by _her._ She chose to dress in dark, militaristically cut garb that highlighted her wings and could apply to either heading. No point in making it easy on them when the whole point had been to make an impression. 

Underestimating Earth might serve to dissuade some from choosing to attack it, but the incident with the Chitauri showed that some might attack it anyway, thinking the planet an easy target. Kyria wanted to drive home a point heard from an actual fictional character she had a good deal in common with: _Earth. Is. Defended._ An impressive and dangerous champion was the best way to make that point, and Kyria well knew that she fit that bill. She was older than most of the Aesir, trained for battle, and self-trained in something they counted as sorcery. A princess to a throne she didn't want, who worked with and to protect those considered beneath her by whatever standard used. 

Her mother had been human; she declined to mention that. 

The casual arrogance of Asgard rubbed her wrong. For all their advancements and longevity, they seemed a marginally more civilized version of Klingons. Thor's earlier problem-solving stratagem of "smash it with a hammer" was an alarmingly prevalent and well-respected view. It really was no wonder Loki was driven off the rails by these people. 

After the fourth (poor) attempt at flirtation and the sixth (crude) invitation to meet in the sparring ring, Kyria took to hovering off Jane's shoulder, her personification of a silently looming, protective shadow broken only by harsh glares at those too ill-mannered to hide their open gawking at her wings. Jane was too torn between fascinated and off-balance to notice, but Thor did, and noted a resemblance to his brother. 

Kyria considered the notion of seeing if she could change her wardrobe choice of black and grey to black and green petty and promptly squashed it. After she pictured the general reaction to the relatively minor change. Highly amusing, but terribly petty. 

Her time was better spent studying the Aether, easily accomplished from her self-delegated post as Jane's bodyguard. There had already been one instance of lack of personal space causing a knock-back wave; as Kyria thought she registered an increase in the hibernation power level, she would much prefer to prevent another. 

"Honored guests" or not, Odin disguised neither his blatant disregard of mortals nor his opinion that Thor would do better to favor another, one not limited to so few years. The human lifespan was barely a blink to the Aesir. Kyria didn't think he was deliberately not helping with the Aether Problem because of his uncontested bias, but neither was he encouraging his subjects to go out of their way to assist. Which generally left Kyria, Jane, and Thor to find a solution on their own. 

Although Jane had the common failing of career scientists to miss out on most social cues, it wasn't possible for her to miss the overwhelming opinion most of the people here held of mortals. 

"I'm pretty sure in . . . Asgardian, 'human' translates to bug, or insect, or something equally unflattering," Jane confessed, shifting uncomfortably in her unfamiliar clothes. 

Kyria grimaced. "I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case. My . . . relatives frequently interchange 'human' with 'worm' or 'mud-monkey.'" Jane frowned. "I never pretended to like them. There's a reason they don’t like me much." 

If the angels were as unhelpful as Odin – and her own dealings with them, combined with Gabriel's and Joshua's accounts, indicated this was the case – she was rather _glad_ they didn't want her. 

"But, come one. Thor said to meet him on the veranda," Kyria said, changing the subject before Jane could try to delve into the mysteries of angelology. 

Frigga made her appearance right after Thor, with help from Kyria, finished explaining the Convergence to Jane. Somehow the queen managed to obliquely and eloquently pass approval on both the subject of her son's affections and her guardian without saying a thing about either. The queen was poised and perceptive, and with a single thoughtful look seemed to know everything about Kyria. It was both uncomfortable and welcoming, but before Kyria could ask why, an alarm sounded across the plaza. 

"The prison," Frigga identified, with some alarm herself. Thor glanced at the source of the sound, then back to Jane, conflicted. "Go," she told her son. "We will look after her." Not particularly surprised, Kyria nodded her agreement. 

Released from having to choose between duties, Thor wasted no time in dropping his cloak and leaping over the balcony, grabbing Mjolnir in a perfectly timed maneuver. Points to the prince. That _had_ to be practiced. 

Turning away from the edge, Frigga gestured for the two Midgardians to follow. "Come. We must go." 

She led them through the heart of the palace, where the king was deploying the guards. "Odin." 

"Frigga," he replied, before dismissing the soldiers to their posts. "It's a skirmish. Nothing to fear." 

"You've never been a very good liar," the queen countered, a note of fondness in her voice. Clearly the royals had real affection for each other. Maybe asshole was something Odin had grown into? 

"Take them to your chambers," he ordered. "I'll come for you when it's safe." 

And the asshole was back. Chauvinistic asshole, even. Kyria could more than defend herself in a fight, and no woman of Asgard could have as much power and respect as Frigga held and be a slouch in battle, even in as patriarchal a society as this. 

Sif openly defied the restricted expectations of what a woman could do. Of course, Sif also glared at Jane as she passed with the soldiers. Whether because Jane was mortal or because the All-Father thought she should have Jane's place at Thor's side, Kyria couldn't say. She didn't think Sif actually was in love with Thor, just familiar with the idea that many thought they would be a good match. Add in good looks, a lifetime friendship, and a royal title, and shake well for a special guest appearance of the green-eyed monster. 

Seemingly oblivious to the apparent rivalry around her, Frigga said, "Take care." 

Odin affectionately reached for his wife. "Despite all I have survived, my Queen still worries for me." 

"It's only because I worry over you that you have survived," she retorted, before leading her charges away. The queen snatched a short sword from the scabbard of a passing soldier and Kyria hid a smirk. Odin must be getting old to buy the meek wife act. 

"Listen to me now," Frigga ordered sternly as they hurried through the corridors. "I want you to do everything I ask – no questions." 

"Yes, ma'am," Jane promptly agreed. 

Kyria opened her mouth to agree and stopped abruptly as something tickled her senses. 

"What is wrong?" Frigga asked. 

"There are – drops - of Aether," she said haltingly, uncertain what it was she was sensing. "Things . . . powered by something of the same hand and – someone consumed by it?" 

"Kursed," Frigga breathed. 

"They're here for me, aren't they?" Jane asked. 

Kyria thought of a terrible plan. 

"You can _do_ that?" 

"It's energy – and I manipulate energy. In recent years I've broadened the scope of what I can handle. I wasn't going to suggest it if there was anything better, and there was time to find something better. We're out of time." 

"I do not believe this is a wise course of action," Frigga objected. "Using the Tesseract is not the same as attempting to force the Aether from its vessel. It does not _have_ a stable form outside of a host." 

"If I limited myself to wise actions I would never have been in a position to come here," Kyria countered. "I _know_ it isn't a very good idea, but the alternative involves pitting a fragile mortal against an army believed to have been destroyed five thousand years ago. It may not be a _good_ idea, but it is a _better_ one." 

"As I cannot dissuade you, I must assist you to ensure you do not engage in needless risks. Come," Frigga continued. "If you are to attempt to untangle the Aether from Jane Foster, it would undoubtedly be best to attempt such where we will not be disturbed." 

***

"Have you done anything like this before?" Jane asked nervously, half sitting up on the bed. 

"No." 

"No?" she repeated, voice straining for a higher pitch. 

Kyria considered. "I consumed the full power of an overloading nuclear reaction; used my personal energies to hold close a breach between the Earth and Hell planes; drained gamma radiation off the Hulk; transferred enough of my energy into the electrical wiring of SHIELD's Helicarrier that its systems seemed to be extensions of my body; used that connection to construct flexible force fields to seal a breach in a friend's chest; and channeled the energy of a half-sentient alien energy device into a form the Iron Man armor could use. None of that is quite like trying to remove a half-sentient, highly destructive alien energy from its living host without further harm to the host than already accrued by prolonged exposure to said energy." 

The astrophysicist's complexion was pale. "But you have experience testing dangerous energies on yourself." 

"That's one way to put it." 

"Just how dangerous is this?" 

"For you, no more dangerous that be possessed by a half-sentient, highly destructive alien energy that is going to kill you in a few days at most." 

Kyria hadn't thought it possible, but Jane paled further. "That's . . . rather blunt." 

She shrugged. "My bedside manner is usually called on to deal with hard-headed, paranoid, gun-wielding idiots who try to run themselves into the ground." 

"Oh. Well. That makes sense then." 

"I do not wish to stress you unduly, but the longer you delay, the greater the possibility that one of the trespassers may slip past our forces," Frigga pointed out mildly. 

Kyria grimaced at the reminder. "Lie back, Jane, and try to relax." 

"What's not relaxing about non-physical surgical removal of an energy-based parasite?" 

The half-interdimensional-energy-being raised an eyebrow and Jane subsided. "I've never done this before – it may hurt," Kyria warned. Jane nodded nervously and closed her eyes. Kyria also closed her eyes, reaching first for the unruly energy that coursed beneath her skin. Centering herself in liquid lightning, she reached outward, to the murky, tumultuous rawness that lurked just out of sight within the mortal scientist. 

***

_**Red.**_

All-consuming, ever-hungering red. So strong it could obliterate everything in its path. 

She was in its path. 

But she did not mean to stand against it – such was futile foolishness. Meaningless and without hope of success. 

Jane had strength, in spirit and in mind, if not in body. Such allowed her to retain her self in the eye of a storm of red. But oceans wore down mountains, and Jane could not hope to be a mountain. Not in this. She would fall. She _was_ falling. Incrementally, but surely. 

Isolating the red from Jane was nigh impossible. The red was too vast. Isolating Jane from the red was of more manageable magnitude. 

She found Jane, battered and slipping within the red maw. She found every place where the sense of Jane blurred, where it splintered and scattered, and she reeled in the fraying threads, shoring up weaknesses with blue-edged white. 

Its opposition removed, the red grew, spreading and stretching into the holes where once was Jane. But the volume of space denoted Jane was limiting on the infinity of red. 

Once Jane was concentrated into a single, bright, lighting-shielded spark, she dropped a piece of the barrier keeping the red away from Kyria. Numerous names over the ages but she always came back to that one. She had been Kyria before she learned she was Morningstar. 

Kyria was bigger than Jane, broader and sturdier, with more room for the red to expand into. As the red moved into the region that was Kyria, the designated occupant turned, pulling to the side to allow the red entry, while drawing the red in and away from Jane. Pushing Jane and pulling red, she drew it in closer, watching it relinquish Jane little by little. It wanted Kyria more than Jane and she needed to ensure it traded one for the other. 

Oddly, the red helped. It _wanted_ to be whole. It wanted _one_ or _all,_ not separate pieces.  Jane would not remain connected to Kyria, and if it occupied both, the red would be split. It did not want to be split. 

The moment the red cleared the edge of Jane, she darted forward and released Jane from the concentrated bundle, then promptly ducked back out and cut the connection behind her. 

Jane was alone in her space again. Almost certainly disoriented, but alone, and protected against further incursions. 

The red was within Kyria now. 

She was more familiar with Kyria's capabilities now than she had been even two years ago. She knew where the sparking white-blue had brushed against angry green, and hypnotic blue, and oozing black, and industrial rainbow, the distinct colors long since assimilated into the ever shifting lightning. She knew what waited beneath the arcing branches, knew the sharp peaks, and rough edges, and hidden pitfalls, better than the red ever could. She had the home field advantage. 

But the red was endless and relentless, tireless with infinite time and resources to bring to bear against her. 

She was the mountain to the crimson ocean. Mountains could not stand, but islands did. There was but a single scarlet entity; she split Kyria into an archipelago, separate but linked, pieces of a cohesive whole, floating amidst the vast sea of red. Each piece was bound in blue-white, joined to its fellows by twisting chains buried in the red. 

Every line of every feather was traced with convulsing white threaded through with midnight blue. Before the red, before the blue and the green and the rainbow, she had kept the wings bound, kept the being that was Kyria hooded where none could find it. The mass of crowding, enticing, overwhelming blue had flooded the feathers, breaking millennia old instinctive bindings. Had they still been so bound, the weight of red would surely have drowned them, and her with them. 

She had held Kyria against so many and for so long that newly whole as she was, she could hold Kyria against the onslaught of red. 

Then the physical plane shuddered, breaking her focus and her grip, slipping her beneath the surface of the crimson maelstrom.


	4. Mirror Mirror

Perhaps the Norns had a sense of humor after all. 

Loki never used to think so, certainly. Having repeatedly failed to find them, he tended to picture them as spiteful and malicious, cackling over the misfortunes of others. Now though . . . well, now he was reconsidering a good number of things. 

Like this place of endless books and no Thor. Once, he would have considered such a place a secret retreat, hidden and gloated about in circular riddles. Instead he entered a prisoner. Now, he was not certain. Certainly “prison” would not be his first choice of description for all that he could not use magic. 

In the case of the Norns' potential sense humor – well, what else could account for the . . . unusual composition of the beings residing in the unassuming dwelling? A flighty sprite caught up in perceived excitement, a drunken seer burdened by the destinies of others, a many-tentacled thing wearing human form, and an irreverent messenger reinterpreting and ignoring assigned duties. 

A poetic description, perhaps, but not untrue. Truth was as sharp a weapon as any the Vanir had ever wielded. But it cut both ways. 

He did not understand how such vastly different beings could coexist peaceably in the small quarters they kept. The sprite said the seer had an even smaller dwelling once, but upgraded when he kept adding houseguests. 

First being the one which wore the skin of another. An abomination, surely, yet absolved by those with self-given license to kill such things. She – if such had gender – had come to lighten the seer's burden. To weave fact into fiction, to gentle the bite of truth with pretty lies, to keep those who knew such things from having all their secrets bared to the world. Not an ignoble endeavor. 

Next came the sprite. Fixated on drawing her own truths out from the obfuscation of truth she perceived as fiction. She envied the seer's mind, and his form, and instigated a courtship. Truly she was relentless, possibly more than a little fixated, but also capable of learning restraint. She was also the closest of the lot to the Midgardian standard of "ordinary." 

The delinquent messenger had technically been the first to join the seer's household – as guardian – but had long hidden himself behind the protective screen of distance, eschewing attachments even to the kin he undertook to watch and protect in the manner of his kind of old, long since fallen out of use. A soldier without a commander, he made his own rules, yet kept to the spirit of his former orders. A contradiction that wasn't. 

Despite himself, Loki found himself intrigued by them all. He, an unwanted lie-smith driven to madness by truth, an unwilling fifth side to the strange dynamic given shape beneath a single roof. 

None of them should fit. Yet all did. 

Even him, loathe though he was to admit it. 

Only two were the weak mortals the characterized Midgard, yet neither was weak. And all four were Midgardians, for the planar dimensions of "Heaven" and "Purgatory" were limited to but this one realm, as evidenced by the denizens' need to occupy the form of mortals. 

It should have been weak and degrading. It wasn't. Loki was at a loss to why. 

Perhaps it had something to do with the way they acted around him. He had attempted to take over their world – they didn't particularly care. He could have been Aesir, Jotun, mortal, or bilgesnipe and they _wouldn't care._

Loki had tried to provoke a reaction from them. Gabriel bound his magic – truly the only restraint he chafed against – so he was left with words rather than illusions, but words were always his best weapons. He taunted them with the bloody history of Jotunheim, with his various misdeeds on Asgard, with the body count of his failed takeover of their pitiful planet. 

The one called Eleanor merely shrugged and admitted to killing a few when she had first arrived. The renegade sentinel who used Loki's name conjured a sugary confection and said he tormented humans as part of his day job. The mortal who reminded him of nothing so much as a sprite, perhaps one who'd overindulged on mead, babbled on about blood and choices and redemption. The keystone of the group glanced around furtively, muttering about mad titans and blaming Becky for the lack of alcohol in the house. 

Loki found enough give to his bonds to shed his Aesir form, which was perhaps the worst failure of all; the ice and blue that was his birthright disgusted him far more than it could two who had seen worse and two who knew worse was out there. After all, these had not grown up with tales of Jotun monsters. What knowledge they had of non-mortals was of "angels" and "demons" and the efforts of both to bring about their equivalent of Ragnorak. World conquest was not as worrisome as world destruction. 

Even he acknowledged that, and though he _had_ attempted the latter, the quartet absolved him of blame. 

"It's natural to overreact to learning you were adopted. Ansem didn’t take it well either." 

"Odin adopted you, raised you to think your biological family were terrible monsters, and expected you _wouldn't_ freak out? That's bad planning on his part." 

"The human legal system would describe that as extreme emotional distress. Possibly emotional abuse." 

"You got nothing on my brother, sorry. Luci takes temper tantrums to a whole new level. _Took,_ anyway, and I doubt his stint in timeout has changed anything." 

It was . . . odd, to find himself surrounded by people who knew the worst about him and did not hold it against him. Yes, he desired to be free to use his magic again, but . . . Loki found that he preferred this existence. It was . . . intriguing. And they all plied him with books. As much as he initially planned to hate his jailors, he found himself hard-pressed to loathe any who valued books as much as they. 

They left books for him, in his room, beside his door, on various tables and surfaces, in all corners of the house. Books of Midgardian history, mortal religions, collected legends of Asgard’s long ago dealings with the realm, pretty little fictions crafted by mortal minds. 

Then there were the works of the seer. 

Loki was not unfamiliar with seers. His mo – Frigga was one. Frigga, like traditional seers, experienced glimpses of the future and kept such gleanings to herself. 

Chuck was not remotely close to that kind of seer. He primarily saw the present or the near-present, interwoven with threads of the past and plans for the future. Although he was indisputably a seer, he was called “prophet” instead. He wrote his seeings and published them as books of fiction. Strangely enough, the seer had not known he was a seer or that what he saw was truth until directly confronted by the focal points of his visions. Perhaps that made him a poor seer, or perhaps it was a result of the general Midgard disbelief in things they couldn’t explain. An entire realm in which most of the inhabitants thought magic was tricks and lies. 

It was not just because of Thor’s attachment that Loki’s attempted invasion had been of this realm, after all. 

But of all the strange creatures pressed into Loki’s company, the seer was the one to watch. And not simply because he was the reason the otherwise discordant group had gathered. On the surface, Chuck seemed the epitome of mortal weakness, nervous in the company of others and uncomfortable in his own skin, even if he no longer chose to constantly imbibe spirits. Likely because neither Eleanor nor Becky were inclined to allow such behavior. As Eleanor was inhuman and deceptively sedate and Becky was hyperactive and engaged in a courtship with the seer, he was unlikely to go against either. However, anyone who survived years of Gabriel’s erratic and extravagant quirks must possess some internal strength. In rare, unguarded moments, Loki thought he sensed a strength of spirit within the writer, so strong he felt the irrational urge to quail. 

The diverse group came together for the seer, and they stayed together because of the seer. As confusing as Loki found both group and seer, he could not deny he was intrigued by them all. 

He was also intrigued by the shape of the seer’s writings. 

Sentinels and Defilers played at being Midgard's Norns and Chuck was the chosen archivist to chronicle the struggle. And while, yes, Ragnorak had long been foretold, the featured players of Midgard sought to change the nature of the script. 

And they were succeeding! Mortals, against fate! Loki could not decide if it was because the only one with absolute power over Midgardians' destinies was not participating or because the winged woman, with mixed angel, demon, and mortal heritage, slipped beneath the sight of those who held the reins of power. 

So, yes, perhaps it was best he had failed at his attempted conquest. It also seemed, perhaps, that was the inevitable outcome. He _could_ not succeed because other forces were in motion and such a shift would not be countenanced. Loki found it rather amusing that so many had "glorious purposes" for the fate of such an inconsequential planet. 

And he got to read about them all. Even if Gabriel had developed the irritating habit of interrupting his reading for one reason or another. He was nearly certain the archangel chose to intrude just before the climatic scene on purpose. It was _annoying._

(Contrarily, Gabriel’s habit of disappearing without a word for days was nearly as annoying. Likely because his reappearances tended to be heralded by abrupt alterations to the structure of the dwelling. When Gabriel returned, staircases could be known to spiral, move to the thresholds of bedrooms, or disappear to be replaced by trampolines, while hallways led to different rooms, which were in the wrong places or of different size or color.) 

Any action made by any being on the mortal plane in regards to the preordained brothers was within the purview of the seer. Chuck saw it all and was duty bound to record it. The winged one and the archer had the authority to prevent Chuck from selling his work for the mindless hordes to read, but no one had such authority to prevent said mindless horde from uniting to form a mind. As such, there now existed two very difficult continuations of the tale of the brothers. 

One was the actual events taking place. Recorded in the first half of the published novels and continued onward without presentation to any beyond the “Prophet Support Group, PSG for short,” as Becky perkily termed the odd group. Chuck’s accounts closely followed the pair of brothers marked for bigger things, but the doings of others were scattered and incomplete. The others, particularly the winged woman and her cohorts, were transitory, coming and going from the brothers’ daily lives with irregularity, and as such, Chuck’s visions revealed little about their own personal dealings. 

Becky remarked that most of them were “heroes of another story,” before going on a long-winded, yet breathless explanation of “TV tropes” and “fan communities.” 

The other side of the continuation diverged at _The Monster at the End of the Book_ and was not limited to Chuck’s hand. This tale spoke of what _could be,_ or what _might be,_ of things were different. Eleanor mainly authored this work, mixing facts from Chuck and suggestions from Gabriel. Because this tale was essentially “fan fiction,” Becky was allowed an increasing contribution as long as she was able to write in the style and manner of the first portion of the series. 

It was truly fascinating to examine the wealth of _possibilities_ that went into the marketable version. 

"We can't write the reality," Eleanor explained. "These are real people who don't want their private lives made public. Not to mention the very high likelihood of compromising SHIELD's security or accidentally revealing the existence of the supernatural to the world at large. They're the ones that asked for my help when the fans put pressure on Chuck. Because SHIELD for the most part doesn't know this sort of thing is real, Kyria could not bring the full weight of the agency down to quash it. She brought me in instead." 

"Eleanor's a really good writer," Becky chirped. "Not that Chuck is bad – he's really not – but Eleanor has to plan out where the story is going before she writes it. We still do the monster-of-the-week stuff, but there's more of a prevalent arc tying it all together. Of course, to move the series forward without bringing in more of SHIELD, we went with the Lilith plot instead – I say we, but that was before I got involved – it's a really heart-wrenching arc and because Orion hasn't made any more public appearances, it doesn't clash with real life. Because the Lilith-deal arc wouldn’t be much of an _arc_ if Orion was around to pull her Bela-trick. So we wrote a plausible reason for her to be out of touch. More plausible because we _Supernatural_ -ed the Battle of New York. I _did_ get to help with that, which was so amazing because I always wanted to write the _Supernatural_ characters and now I can! Well, as long as I keep it in line with the rest of the books. I still do fanfics though, more reading than writing these days. They have some _really_ good pairings that I _never_ would have thought to do." 

Gabriel unconvincingly turned a snicker into a cough. "Kyria pretty much gets paired with everyone. She is _not_ happy about that." 

"But Kyki fics are amazing!" the sprite objected vehemently. "Kyria's probably the only character in the series who can trump Loki's family drama. Their relationship is all about not letting your family define you and making your own path! Everyone loves redemption stories." 

It was startling to think that there were mortals writing about his life. Random, insignificant mortals making conjectures, both farfetched and on-point, about his history and where he could go from here. Many tried to turn his character into some kind of hero. 

“Everyone loves a redeemed villain!” Becky explained. “It’s like Darth Vader!” When he professed ignorance, Loki found himself dragged to the couch for a movie marathon. “A lesson in pop culture,” the sprite corrected sternly. “No one can go through life and _not know_ Darth Vader!” 

Becky then suggested some of the “better” fanfiction tales to let him see for himself. From there he explored further and was struck by the sheer _volume_ of stories written about someone else’s characters. Some read like out the source material, others were plausible, if unlikely, and some were exceptionally farfetched. 

“Why would anyone think I would have intimate relations with _Thor?”_ he asked appalled after encountering one too many slash tags. 

“I write Sam and Dean together,” Becky exclaimed. “Well, not anymore. But I _did.”_

He was still in too much shock to pay much attention to her rambled explanation about subtext and wish-fulfillment and out-of-character. 

Loki never managed to block that particular pairing, and he found an obscene number of stories that mutilated his character beyond comprehension, but among the masses there were a few intriguing ones that made surprising astute observations and left him thinking. 

"It's like cheerleading tryouts. You're surrounded by enthusiasm, but most of them aren't any good," Gabriel said sagely. 

From a more detached perspective, "Loki" made for a highly dynamic fictional character. "Carver Edlund" had introduced the character in _Illegal Aliens,_ which was not at _all_ how his failed invasion had gone. Still, the reading made for an acceptable distraction. Loki was oddly interested in the book series, even if the two Lokis – Gabriel’s character had not yet been revealed to be an angel – had not yet reappeared. 

For all that they resided in the same house, Chuck tended to avoid Gabriel, and by extension Loki. It seemed odd to favor the company of the many tentacled creature that was the writing assistant rather than the appointed bodyguard, but mortals couldn't see the shadow of "Eleanor's" true self while Gabriel went out of his way to draw attention to his differences. It was also possible that Chuck, as seer of all relating to the potential future conflict, could see something of Gabriel's true self. Loki had managed to catch a glimpse once; it was disconcerting, to say the least. 

Also somewhat disconcerting were the archangel's mood swings. "I'm an awesomely powerful being – I can feel the convergence half a world away. It's like an itch I can't scratch. There's a reason I smite every mosquito that comes near me!" 

Early one morning, Gabriel's reaction to the upcoming alignment of realms took a decidedly different turn. 

"Where'd she go?" he asked suddenly, Skittles forgotten in his hand. Gabriel stood up abruptly, scattering the brightly colored candies all over the floor, and invaded Chuck's office. "Can you see her?" 

"Huh?" The prophet looked up in confusion. 

"Kyria! She was in the middle of the converging mess and then – poof! – I don't know where she went." 

"Whatever happened, I haven't seen a thing. She's not affecting the Winchesters for now," Chuck said with a nervous shrug. The seer tended to be more nervous about his current visions because acting on the visions could change the visions and that gave the nervous little mortal a blinding headache. 

Gabriel, for all that he pretended not to be concerned with the doings of his niece, tended to closely monitor her from afar. The archangel refused to call what he did "spying." But his not-spying evidently had him worried enough to take him off without a word. Chuck flinched at the abrupt departure while Eleanor just sighed and hoped he didn't get into too much trouble. Becky came up with increasingly bizarre theories about what could have happened to Kyria. Loki reigned in his curiosity, adopted an unconcerned air, and went back to his reading. 

Sure enough, Gabriel popped back in that afternoon. "How would you feel about a trip back to visit the folks?" 

"What?" 

"She went to Asgard. You wanna come with me?" 

Loki narrowed his eyes. "Why? So they can use the opportunity to lock me up for my crimes?" 

Gabriel rolled his eyes. "Okay, first, you're _being_ punished for your crimes – Asgard getting in on the action would be overkill and double jeopardy and all that good stuff. Second, you're in _my_ custody. They want you, they have to come through me." He smirked. "I wish them luck with that. So. You in or not?" 

Decisions, decisions. On the one hand, Loki never wanted to step foot on Asgard again. They mocked him, devalued him, and Odin had no right to judge him after lying to him all this time. On the other hand, returning to Asgard as an observer, a visitor, under the authority of another who – flippant and irreverent as he was – made good on his word might be useful. 

He could hear Becky talking – quietly – about how such a trip could have "positive emotional growth" before Eleanor sternly told the sprite to be quiet. 

He wasn't – quite – beholden to Odin anymore. He was curious to see what, if anything, that changed. 

"I will accompany you." 

***


	5. Broken Paths

Based on his understanding of  _Supernatural_  and its fandoms, stories he had heard from his “roommates,” and his own observations from their one meeting, Loki was reasonably certain that Kyria would "knock heads" with the All-Father. It was something of a pity he would not arrive in time to witness their first meeting. He rather suspected it would be a clash between titans and would have greatly enjoyed witnessing the All-Father facing some measure of discomfort.

Becky’s beloved “fanfics” allegorized such as the meeting as that of an immovable object and an unstoppable force. In such a metaphor, Odin was immovable and Kyria, unstoppable.

That said, he had not expected Kyria to lay ruin to the palace. It seemed somewhat out of character for the winged woman.

Then again, when last he had seen of her, neither her eyes nor wings glowed red. The deep black feathers now shone with a red sheen, while her irises were writhing rings of lightning on balls of red. Both effects were rather alarming and unsettling and emphasized her inhumanity. It was easy to see _Supernatural_ ’s “Morningstar” as she was now.

Perhaps that might explain why she was standing in the center of the throne room surrounded by fallen palace guards.

Of course, the aberrant red would not explain the crashed ship or the masked attackers, although it appeared similar to the red of the being of glowing, cracked stone she was currently engaged in fighting.

Beside him, Gabriel gave a long suffering sigh.

"She does this sort of thing often?" Loki guessed.

"Unfortunately," his guardian agreed.

As he doubted Kyria started such fights as Thor was wont, he could only hypothesize that she instead entered into situations where such fights were the natural result; Midgardians called it a "trouble magnet."

One of the white-masked fighters threw a sphere at him. Reflexively, Loki immediately swatted the thing away. It had the effect of opening what appeared to be a micro-blackhole and sucking in everything in its immediate proximity – in this case the unfortunate who had thrown it in the first place.

He turned an aggrieved look to his companion. "Should we interfere? I am not fond of being attacked for no reason."

Gabriel shrugged. "Not much I can do. The base of my power comes from Heaven, which is not exactly connected to Asgard."

It took the kind of control formed from centuries of dealing with blundering fools not to gape stupidly. "You are powerless here," Loki flatly translated. To be  _willingly_  powerless in order to merely ascertain the welfare of another – well, it was not something Loki would countenance. It did, however, offer another facet of the archangel’s relationship with his niece.

But even if Gabriel had suspected a high likelihood of danger facing Kyria, how could he expect to make a difference if he lacked the power to help? Unless that was another motivation behind the archangel’s invitation? But that then implied that Gabriel was willing to trust _him_ with the welfare of the winged woman, at least somewhat.

Loki didn’t know how to respond to that, so he ignored that line of speculation.

"Not  _powerless_ ," Gabriel automatically objected. "Just . . . lacking extra power to throw around. It wasn’t like I expected to show up in the middle of a battle!"

Loki turned away. Irresponsible and used to being the most powerful person in the room. So why did Loki feel the urge to keep him from harm? Hmm, probably because he suspected Gabriel made for a better jailor than would Odin. Even in “jailor” probably wasn’t the best word to describe the situation. (He refused to even think the word “friend” although it occasionally hovered just beyond conscious thought.)

"Then you should remove yourself from the center of the field of battle, should you not?" Loki noted sharply.

Gabriel rolled his eyes. "So demanding. I suppose you want access to your powers, too."

"That would be helpful."

_Snap_.

A wall he could not always tell was there was abruptly gone.

With a figurative shoulder roll to acclimate to magicks he had been unable to use for some time, Loki felt a predatory grin take shape.

"Have fun. Don't do anything I wouldn't do," Gabriel quipped before snapping his fingers again and vanishing.

After so long with nothing but the Midgardians and their words and stories, a battle made for a nice change of pace. He might not be as battle-happy as the musclebound warriors who always scorned him, but Loki could appreciate a good fight. And even if he shied away from calling Asgard his home anymore, he did not wish it destroyed.

The defenders recognized him immediately. "Prince Loki!" he heard several soldiers alternatively whisper in benediction, gasp in recognition, or cry out in vigor. Strangely (and oddly pleasing) not a one reacted to his sudden appearance with suspicion or hostility. Likely due to his obvious actions  _against_  the attackers. But surely sentiment had turned against him when he led an army to enslave Midgard. Unless . . . the All-Father had not made such actions known?

Prematurely activating another gravitation sphere while still on its white-masked possessor's belt, it occurred to Loki that that was indeed something Odin would have done. His false-father would not have wished to let his own failing be known before Loki was brought back in defeat. It followed then that few knew what had happened to him since his fall from the Bifrost. Loki was a savior, come in their hour of need, not a disgraced prince, prematurely back from exile.

He could work with that.

With renewed purpose, Loki set about the field, striking out at assailants who failed to take note of the new figure in their midst. Then there was a great cracking explosion and he failed to duck in time to avoid being struck by a flying piece of red stone.

_Red stone_  –

Sure enough, when he turned, the Red Morningstar was surveyed the smoking ruins of her opponent with something akin to distaste. With an incomprehensible snarl, she stalked towards the entryway, door hanging ajar. No one was fool enough to get in her way, although the masked attackers seemed divided about whether they were disheartened by the destruction of the red stone creature or wanted to follow Kyria to wherever it was she was headed. The beleaguered guards killed the ones that hesitated and were more than happy to see the backs of the ones who left.

Loki followed.

***

The Red Star did not go far. A figure stepped out of a shadowed alcove to meet her.

_"You have something that belongs to me."_

Loki frowned, even as he conjured a veil to ensure none could see him. They spoke the language of Svartalfheim, a world laid to waste by Odin's father. What purpose did Dark Elves have after all this time?

Red Morningstar gave an unconcerned glance at the armored Dark Elves arrayed behind her to prevent retreat, before turning a sharp regard on the speaker and probable leader.

" _Many have thought that,"_  she replied in the same tongue, words that should be foreign rolling off her tongue with a foreboding ease.  _Something_  had happened to the Avenger since her departure from Midgard. Wings flexed behind her, showering red sparks in their wake.  _"I am not one to be commanded."_

The Dark Elf practically bristled.  _"The Aether is mine by right! Give it to me or I will be forced to take it from you!"_

Red-winged Kyria tilted her head in consideration.

"Morningstar! Stop!" thundered Odin, rushing onto the scene with a squadron of armored soldiers.

As the Dark Elves turned to do battle with the oncoming guards, Red-Kyria gave Odin a toothed expression. It could hardly even be called a smile. Red coils undulated up and down her hair and bare arms. Smeared with blood and stone-dust as she was, she looked like the last person one wanted to meet on the battlefield.

_"Malekith,"_  she said, deliberately turning her back on the All-Father. To the Dark Elf leader, she offered her right hand, glowing red.

Odin roared in fury and forced his way through the room, heedless of the battling forces. A black-hole grenade flew towards his back before striking an unseen barrier, briefly causing green ripples in the air as the weapon was deflected back into range of one of the elven fighters.

As much as Loki did not like the All-Father, he was not  _quite_  willing to have him killed. The sprite would be disappointed and the seer surely would not let him read the conclusion of the tale, if that happened. It was probably better that he did not know what Eleanor would do to him in such an event. Or Gabriel, for that matter. He had enough in common with the archangel to know he would probably engage in some psychological torment particularly well-suited to the occasion. It was why, in moments of weakness, he considered the Midgardian being of power something of a kindred spirit.

Malekith, meanwhile, took the proffered hand with a victorious smile. _Malekith_. Loki recognized the name. Wasn't that the Dark Elf whom Odin's father had defeated? Looked like defeat wasn't as permanent as it was made out to be. And the Aether was something out of a lost horror story. Well, today certainly seemed the day for legends to return to life to wreak havoc on the living.

Red-Kyria had not lost her toothed expression. Probably because Loki watched a sword materialize in her free hand an instant before she drove it into Malekith's chest.

The fallen leader's gasp of shock and pain could not be heard over the sounds of battle as he dropped her hand to clutch at his chest, but the betrayed confusion was writ across his face.

Morningstar’s expression shifted into something slightly more detached as she yanked the sword back out. She held the blood coated weapon up, considering.

" _This was the sword of my father. Passed on to me by request of his Father. It had not seen use since before your fall."_  Quick as a flash, she stabbed the dark elf again. " _Fall_ ," she breathed to her victim, " _and never rise again."_

An explosion of red threw Malekith's body backwards to sprawl brokenly on the floor. For an instant, the entire battlefield stopped to look.

Then one of the Dark Elves pushed aside the shock to hurl a grenade at her.

The Red Star whirled effortlessly to point her sword at the oncoming weapon. Red lightning sprang from the tip to catch the grenade in midair, encircling it and keeping it airborne. The remaining Dark Elves, lacking a leader or focal point, were quickly cut down in their shock and confusion.

The field shifted into unease then, the Asgard warriors unsure of what to do with the unstoppable woman standing in their midst. Red-Morningstar solved their problem by gesturing with her empty right hand.

Lightning darted from her fingertips, expanding outwards and forcing a path through the uncertain audience. With certain steps, she walked through the recent battleground without a sideways glance, grenade trapped in red lightning at the end of her sword. Signaling the guards to be prepared for whatever may come, Odin followed.

The uneasy silence spread, everyone watching to see what the lone largely unaffiliated party, the uncontested victor of the battle, did next.

She walked up to the crashed ship, laying obstructive and looming between the fallen pillars. A twitch of the bloody, red lightning bound sword had the captured grenade floating inside. Another twitch and the red lightning vanished from the air. Light flashed within and the exterior of the ship dented inwards in response to the grenade's detonation. A third twitch and red lightning reappeared to cover the now hollow remains. A twist then, and the ship collapsed into a far less imposing heap in the middle of the floor.

Surveying her handiwork, she nodded absently and the sword vanished from her hand. Then her eyes rolled up red and she dropped.

Into Gabriel's waiting arms.

Carefully folding her wings, the archangel released a sigh. "You don't do things by halves, do you, kiddo?"

***


	6. Of Pillars and Branches

Sif was a warrior, a Shield-Maiden of Asgard, a battle companion of Thor.

 She was  _not_  a nursemaid.

 She also was not any sort of healer, nor did she have aspirations of becoming an ornamental guard.

 But one did not easily ignore the suggestions – polite but firm orders – of the queen. Queen Frigga specifically asked Sif to watch over the battle-worn sleeper, so watch over the battle-worn sleeper she would.

 Hmph. Battle-worn sleeper? Try single-handed decimator of the Legend of Svartalfheim. Morningstar, or Orion, or Kyria, or whatever she wanted to call herself, had single-handedly destroyed the Kursed  _and_ the leader of the Dark Elves, long thought dead, but who evidently managed to evade King Bor, father of Odin.

 The winged woman lying unconscious in the bed hardly looked like the subject of increasingly elaborate tales of battle prowess. Nor did she look like one who defied the All-Father. In sleep, she did not flaunt her disdain for Asgard, nor her disrespect for the king, nor her possession of the dangerous, untamed power that was the Aether.

 Contempt for the king of not, the Aether in the hands of one of Morningstar’s abilities was far more dangerous than it had been in the hands of the mortal Foster. Within Foster, the Aether only endangered the mortal and any foolish enough to try to harm her. Within Morningstar –

 Well, Sif had seen what she left behind on the battlefield.

 Unlike her mortal companion, the fear was that the Aether was too well-matched to its host, too-entrenched too be removed. All the insolence of the Morningstar combined with all the power of the Aether into one unstoppable being.

 The Sentinel responded with scornful expressions and claimed his niece was too much like her father to ever be second-fiddle. At the blank looks, he rolled his eyes and slowly explained that meant she was too damn stubborn to be possessed by _anything_ , primeval power of the universe or not.

 When the whispers began that the Sentinel-Defiler hybrid would _keep_ the Aether . . . Gabriel just shrugged, munched one of his many sugary confections, and replied she wasn’t _that_ much like her father. There was a _reason_ Dad liked her so much.

 Whatever that was supposed to mean.

 "Deep thoughts?"

 Sif started. She had not heard the queen approach. "My queen, I did not mean to slacken my guard -”

 Frigga waved away her concern. "It is alright, my dear. I find Kyria a subject for thorough contemplation as well. I expect one could study her for an age and still be surprised."

 "Like the Sentinel was?"

 "Archangel, Sif," the queen correctly sternly. "It is good manners to call one by the proper name."

 Sif bowed her head.

 "But you are essentially correct," Frigga admitted with a shallow nod of her head. "Though Gabriel knows her better than any other – expect, perhaps, his Father – even he fails predict the extent of her actions. Thus the reason he graced us with his presence."

 Sif struggled to contain her reaction.

 "Not fond of him, Sif?" the queen asked, amusement in her voice. "You're not alone in that. Many find him to be too –”

 "Obnoxious?" Sif offered. "Abrasive?"

 "I was going to go with 'foreign,'" Frigga replied wryly. Sif ducked her head in embarrassment as the queen’s laughter rang out like soft bells. "Your reaction is perfectly natural. Gabriel delights in getting under others’ skins. Much like my son," she added.

 Sif's grimace was automatic and pronounced.

 "It's no secret you do not like Loki," Frigga continued. "Few do. He is . . . difficult to like, I admit. But he is my son, even if not the son of my body. The son of my heart. And long has it pained me that he was so unhappy and unsettled."

 "He tried to kill Thor!" Sif exclaimed, unable to contain herself.

 "An act for which Thor forgives him."

 "And that makes it alright for him to try to kill his brother?"

 "Loki was – troubled during Thor's exile. And to my everlasting sorrow, I was too preoccupied to notice his pain."

 "It was not  _your_  fault!" Sif protested.

 "No? I am his mother. I raised him in ignorance of the truth. A lie perpetuated out of love is still a lie. And this lie hurt him terribly," Frigga said sorrowfully. "My husband mishandled the situation, as he often does when the matter is so close to him. Just because he is a king does not mean he is immune from mistakes," she added with a sideways glance, cutting off any protest Sif could have made.

 "My son – Loki responded poorly to the truth of his heritage. And his situation only went from bad to worse afterwards," the queen continued quietly, staring out the window lost in memory. She turned back to the warrior. "It is why I have only a mother's gratitude for Gabriel. As different as he is, he was what Loki needed. Still needs. Someone who makes different into a shield, rather than a weapon – but knows how to wield it as a weapon all the same. Someone who can relate to him on terms he understands."

 Frigga took a seat at the foot of the bed, smoothing out her skirts and gracefully avoiding sitting on Morningstar’s feet. "Loki is more comfortable in his own skin than I have seen him since before he was of an age to step onto the training grounds."

 Sif had been doing her best to avoid the returned prince, so she had little to say on that point. If nursemaid duty had one benefit, it gave her an excuse not to see the trickster. But, "Some of the guards said – during the confrontation with – Malekith – a, uh, green barrier shielded the king from the attackers' weapons."

 The queen's smile was simply radiant. "I had heard that. It gives me hope that one day my son will once again call Asgard home."

 "He doesn't?" Not that she ever knew what Loki did or thought or why. But if not Asgard, then where? Surely not Midgard with their ignorance and simple ways!

 "No. I'm afraid I allowed Odin to hurt him too much for Loki to move past it so easily. But Gabriel knows well the pain of a broken family. He . . . teaches Loki, without seeming to. My son is healing in his care. It is more than I dared hope for."

 "I . . . am glad for you, my lady. And for your sons," Sif offered awkwardly. As much as she didn’t like Loki – had never liked Loki – she _was_ glad, for Frigga, and especially for Thor.

 Loki's betrayal, and fall, and absence had weighed on Thor. He seemed lighter now that Loki had returned, even if only for a short visit. She did admit that Loki had lost the sharp, bitter edge she had come to associate with the sorcerer. Thor didn't cling to his brother, but he tended to keep him in sight. As though Loki might disappear if he but looked away.

 Well, with Loki's magic abilities, that was not entirely unheard of.

 Frigga smiled as though she knew Sif's mind. It was an expression that had not been turned on her in some time and it was disconcerting. Particularly because Frigga  _was_  a seer and so might very well know what she was thinking.

 "How fares the mortal?" Sif asked, nearly biting her tongue as she realized she had but traded one uncomfortable subject for another. It wasn’t that she wanted the mortal dead – that would undeniably cause Thor pain – but she did not _like_ the mortal. Mortals came and went in scarcely the blink of an eye and thus had no place in Asgard.

 If the queen noticed her discomfort, she did not comment this time. "Well, now that the Aether has left her."

 "Why did you let Morningstar take it?" she asked before she could think better than to question the queen. "That is to say – if the Aether is such a danger – as is she – then –" Words failed to capture her thoughts without straying too close to disloyalty.

 "Why did I allow one my husband withheld judgment on to hold such a potentially devastating power as that of the Aether?" Frigga supplied.

 Sif could only nod her head. She had  _seen_  the woman in battle. Morningstar, possessed of the Aether or not, was not someone Sif ever wanted to meet across a battlefield. How much of what had occurred was Morningstar, and how much was the influence of the Aether? And did it truly matter when the result had been complete disregard for the authority of the All-Father?

 "Many reasons. Partly because Jane Foster would have been helpless when Malekith came to lay claim to the Aether. Partly because Kyria bore no ill effects from having touched the power of the Tesseract, however briefly, and would likewise have some protection against the influence of the Aether. But also because – one such as her is a very rare thing to find."

 With an out of character restlessness, the queen regained her feet and paced to the window. "The Norns are not all-powerful. All living beings have choice. But the . . . outline of the future, if you will, has been . . . guided into shape. Eventually, Ragnorak will come. Such is certainty."

 Ragnorak was not something openly spoken of, but Sif nodded all the same.

 "For the most part, though, Midgard is unguided. The Sentinels’ Father and Creator – the highest power of Midgard – loosened his hand. And in his absence – some of his children seek to bring about their Ragnorak. But Kyria seeks to walk the branches of Yggdrasil."

 "I do not understand," Sif admitted in confusion.

 Frigga offered her a half-smile. "One of Loki’s . . . companions is a seer of Midgard," she explained with a glimmer in her eyes. "And the one assigned to protect the integrity of what he sees is – well, Gabriel, who is well-practiced at circumventing restrictions without appearing to do so. He follows the spirit of his duties still, though he has long abandoned the letter." The queen sighed. "I believe it is better that way."

 "And what does – Kyria – have to do with the Midgard seer?" Sif asked, stumbling slightly on the name. In her opinion, the woman had too many not-quite-titular names.

 "She is one of the subjects of his visions. A frequent contact of the focal pair." Frigga sighed. "She knew of the fate before she learned of the foretelling. That enables her to be a shaper as well as a subject. She seeks to change the shape the Sentinels seek to weave.”

 Like most of Asgard, Sif was not well-versed on the particularities of seers, but she could understand the general form of what the queen was explaining. “Can she do that?”

 "She is changing what was preordained, twisting it around to a shape difficult to follow. She is a branching point. But also a pillar," the queen added thoughtfully, "stable through the ages. Kyria is older than the oldest in Asgard. Pillars are notoriously for being difficult for seers to predict. Her actions, or lack thereof, possess the potential to have more effect on the root of the future than any one being has had in a very long time."

 Sif looked at the sleeping woman. She did not  _look_  like something the future turned upon. Then again, Sif did not know what one such would look like, and her memory of the red-winged creature that dominated the field of battle was something more impressive than this sleeper. "What kind of future will she make?"

 "I do not know," the queen admitted. "There are far too many points in flux."

 At that precise moment, Morningstar seized up, eyes flying open. Sif leapt to her feet, hand on her sword, as the woman choked on air, eyes glowing red.

 “As Gabriel suspected,” Frigga said, producing an intricate patterned metal bowl that seemed to draw in all light. “No longer having a need, she rejects the Aether.”

 Holding the bowl out to Morningstar, the queen began to sing in a language Sif did not recognize. Unable to understand the words, it sounded like a lullaby. The melody whispered of finding peace and coming home and _belonging_.

 Choking and gagging over the side of the bed, Morningstar coughed up copious amounts of glowing red. Sif watched with perverse interest as the red shifted and twisted in the bowl. When the woman finally released the last of the Aether, Frigga snapped a metal cover on the bowl, just as ornately designed as its counterpart, still singing softly.

 With eyes gray instead of red, Morningstar looked dubiously at the bowl as she struggled to regain her breath.

 Frigga smiled. "It was designed to contain the power of the Aether. As strong as our smiths can make it." Somehow, the words did not break the spell of the song and the queen picked the thread of music back up as smoothly as if it had never been dropped.

 Morningstar gave a weary nod before collapsing back down on the bed, breathing in time to the hum of the queen’s song.

 For a moment, as the light glittered and the music floated, Sif did not see the placid sleeper or the irreverent visitor or the red-winged warrior. She saw all and none of them.

 She saw an ethereal woman with wings extending over the branches of Yggdrasil. Although demonstrably insubordinate to the All-Father, Morningstar had acted in the Realms’ interest by striking down Malekith and the Kursed – hopefully, as her influence spread, Morningstar continued to act in such a manner.

 Regard of the queen or not, if Morningstar so desired, Sif did not doubt that she had the power to destroy them all.

 

***

 


	7. Fragmented Mirrors

Kyria didn’t know whether to blame Gabriel, Clint, or Tony for her urge to shout “Boo!” at the people who somehow managed to capture the image of nothing so much as alien sheep.

 Probably a combination of all three. Nat would clean her nails with her knives, whereas Coulson would simply raise an eyebrow. Kyria had pretty much done both of those already.

 Needless to say, it hadn’t worked as well for her. Or maybe it didn’t work on alien sheep. Possibly a combination of the two.

 As much as she was willing to drop to the petty depths of black and green clothing, the effect would have been diminished by Loki’s actual presence. Also, Gabriel. The trickster archangel would never let her pull the intimidating act. He would be too busy laughing his ass off and making up embarrassing stories.

 Come to think of it, that was probably what he _was_ doing regardless.

 It wasn’t appear to be working.

 If the people of Asgard had had mixed reactions to her before, they gave her a wide berth now, even if the Aether was safely contained, nowhere near her. Kyria didn't need to flutter wings to remind them she was different anymore. There wasn't a one who hadn't heard some variation of the tale of the red winged force of destruction and how she had deliberately ignored the orders of  _Odin_  on the battlefield.

 Nevermind that she had been, in effect, bringing about the outcome the Odin would have wanted had she discussed it with him in a rational manner beforehand. Nope. She just turned her back on the king and ignored his command to stop.

  _And he hadn't killed her._

 The quick spawning rumors that Odin was old and afraid were halted in their infancy by the rotating accompaniment of the queen and both princes. Most times at least one of the three was at her side, sometimes more. If not with her, they tended to be involved in repairing the damage to the palace. Kyria helped, even though the warriors and masons abruptly stopped talking when she arrived. She wasn’t above giving them toothy smiles.

 As if physical presence wasn’t enough support, Thor loudly professed his gratitude for her sparing Lady Jane from the Aether and the Dark Elf who would have laid waste to Asgard to obtain it. Loki, flourishing in the new regard of Asgard, worked more than ever to set himself apart. Keeping company with the Red Star and her Sentinel (in her head, Kyria amusingly pictured that as the Lone Centurion protecting Communist Russia or maybe China – Russell T Davies was either having cold sweats or a brilliant epiphany) was a highly efficient method of doing so. Through long experience with her uncle, Kyria knew better than to offend the trickster prince by insinuating he had befriended his archangelic counterpart.

 As for the queen – well. Frigga was a mother. In addition to having earned her gratitude for uniquely aiding both Loki and Thor, Kyria somehow managed to find herself counted among those Frigga considered her children. Kyria didn’t know whether to be flattered or offended. She had her own mother, admittedly long dead. She didn’t mention that. Instead, Kyria pointed out  _she_  was the elder of the two.

 The queen just smiled.

 "Is one ever too old for a mother's love, Kyria?"

 Breath stopped. A heartbreakingly familiar voice clawed its way up from the depths of memory to remind her that _Shryhna_ was waiting and she would see her _khyryah_ later.

 Kyria supposed it was true enough for a certain definition of later.

 While she stared stupidly, trying to shove that skeleton back into its closet, the queen gave her a quiet sort of sad smile. It made Kyria’s heart clench more than it already was. As though she knew that, Frigga laid a hand briefly on her shoulder before walking away to speak with her adopted son.

 She was glad and distressed and distressed that she was glad that Frigga left. But the lack of the queen’s immediate presence let Kyria push the flash of memory away, allowing her to recover her briefly dropped composure and not bawl and/or jibber away in a corner somewhere.

 Let Loki deal with family drama and regal mothers. Whatever issues Loki might still have with Odin – and there were a  _lot_  if Gabriel was any indication – the prince could not find the vitriol to repudiate Frigga as his mother. She was probably the only one who ever supported him growing up.

 It took a goblet of Asgardian mead to settle her enough to watch Frigga fuss over her son. No wonder Thor had such a high alcohol tolerance – Asgardian liquor was significantly stronger than most of what even Stark stocked in his bar. Unlike standard Earth alcohol in normal quantities, Kyria could feel the mead. It could probably get Steve drunk.

 Maybe she would ask Thor to bring some of this stuff back. She kind of wanted to see what happened when Steve got drunk.

 Jane thought about it. “Don’t invite Tony.”

 Kyria snorted. “Only if the goal is an Avengers frat party. I don’t think even New York’s ready for that.”

 Jane’s eyes slid towards Loki. Kyria looked from Jane to him and back, and raised an eyebrow.

 The astrophysicist made an aborted, embarrassed shrugging motion. "I still sort of blame him for New York."

 "That wasn't all Loki," Kyria reminded the scientist.

 "Yeah, well, mind-control, freak-outs, or not, he hurt Thor," Jane said stubbornly. "But his, um, therapy is going well?"

 "Gabriel wouldn't have brought him here if it wasn't."

 "You sure about that?” she asked dubiously.

 Kyria swallowed her automatic assurance upon remembering that her uncle spent most of his days playing dangerous, often fatal pranks on assholes. There were a lot of assholes on Asgard.

“He reminds him of my father.”

 “The same guy our mythology paints as the devil and who Odin freaked out you were the daughter of?”

 That didn’t help the case at all, did it? “You don’t get to be the brightest star in Heaven by starting out bad.”

 Jane frowned. “So all the angels that want you dead for being Lucifer’s daughter liked Lucifer once upon a time?”

 “Yes.” Kyria let out a slow breath. “We caught Loki early enough to stop his fall.”

 “You attach a lot of significance to falling, don’t you?”

 “It’s part of the cultural lingo, like Morningstar Abomination. And when you consider that when I fell off the roof of Stark Tower, I released Lilith – let’s just say it fits.”

 “I thought you fell off the roof because of the Tesseract?”

 “I did.”

 “Huh,” Jane said, looking thoughtful. “Well I guess it’s good that Loki won’t be evil. I mean, he's getting along with Thor, which is good. And he still cares what his mother thinks of him, so he can't be  _all_  bad."

 "There's a rumor going around the Loki's magic saved Odin," Kyria added.

 "Really? Did – did that really happen, or is it just a rumor, like that one that said you were Thor's daughter?"

 Kyria laughed. Some of the Asgardians glanced towards her and then hurriedly looked away. "Blame SHIELD for that one. If Phil hadn't been out of it, he’d be my number one suspect. However, as he has an ironclad alibi, I narrowed the list of possible culprits to Charlie, Bela, or Nick. As for Loki, I heard it from Gabriel, so make of that what you will."

 "Charlie the enthusiastic lesbian hacker, Bela your vaguely homicidal paperwork minion, and Nick . . .”

 Kyria saw on Jane’s face the moment realization hit.

 “ _Director Fury_ makes up rumors about you?"

 "There's a sci-fi author writing  _books_  about me. If it  _was_  Fury, he was just muddying the waters."

 "This is why I don't work for SHIELD."

 "You're on their books," Kyria pointed out. "You’re also on Stark’s. They paid for you to come to London and for me to come bail you out of a potential catastrophe."

 Jane frowned. "I guess they're not  _so_  bad," she said grudgingly.

 "They pay for you to play with science and meet with your alien boyfriend and not get killed in the process?"

 “. . . maybe."

 "Welcome to SHIELD, Dr. Foster, where we pay you to put yourself at risk, while paying to minimize said risks."

 Jane raised her eyebrows. "Your life is  _weird_. And I don't use that term often."

 "Because your life qualifies as weird too?"

 "I think I am going to call my mother when I have service again," Jane said, watching Frigga and Loki and deliberately ignoring the question.

"Here." Kyria produced her most recent upgraded StarkPhone.

"What am I supposed to do with this –  _you have service?!_  How is that even possible?! We're on a whole other planet – realm – dimension – I haven't quite decided which and kind of want to return with my equipment so I can figure it out but that doesn’t actually have anything to do with why your phone works when it’s not even on Earth anymore!"

 Kyria shrugged. She'd been working on protecting her phone from outside interference and Morningstar-related electrical problems, but until this trip, had not realized she had taken it so completely off the network. Although she had always been able to call Gabriel – even if he never answered – and she had long suspected his phone didn't really exist, so, maybe it was a work in progress. "Ever seen  _Doctor_   _Who_?"

 "You  _sonic screwdrivered your phone?!"_  Jane all but shrieked, much to the startlement of at least half the room. "Oh my God! That's incredible! What? Darcy made me watch it."

 "And I'm sure your former intern would corroborate that statement."

 The scientist glared at her. "That. Is. Not. The. Point. How do you have cell phone service in Asgard?"

 Kyria shrugged, not having worked out the particulars while trying to deal with the threat of the Aether. "I figure it connects to my Morningstar-ness and  _that_  is connected to Earth. And,  _no,_  I don't know exactly how my inhuman heritage interacts with the physical world. Stark scans me every chance he gets to try to work it out."

 "Has he found anything yet? Do you think he'd let me work on it? Or at least see his data?"

 Suppressing a familiar sigh, Kyria cut her off before Jane could descend too deep into Science. "Call your mother. Maybe Darcy and Erik as well."

 "Do you have anyone to call?"

 "SHIELD knows where I am. Bela can reach me if there's an emergency."

 Jane bit her lip.

 Kyria sighed. "Ask," she ordered, knowing whatever it was would gnaw at the scientist, driving them both to distraction before she blurted out the question  _anyway_.

 "I know about your father and all that, but . . . what happened to your mother?"

 A sharp pain lanced through her chest. First Frigga, now Jane. Sometimes Kyria was over-appreciative of the fact that most of her close associates had screwed up family lives. It meant they didn't ask those questions.

 “She died when I was young," she said in a detached voice.

 "You're over five thousand years old,” Jane pointed out. "How young is 'young'?  _Three_  thousand? Three hundred? Thirty?"

 "Eight." Approximately. Young enough that she wasn’t entirely clear on the dates involved. Young enough that she barely even _remembered_ her mother – the face in her memory was blurred – mostly just a soft voice and the knowledge she was loved. Beloved. _Khyryah._

 Jane’s eyes bulged as the blood drained from her face.  "Oh my God," she gasped.

 "She died protecting me from demons who would have delivered me to my father." Tortured to death because she wouldn't tell the black eyed abominations where she had hidden her blissfully oblivious daughter, but Jane didn't need to know that.

 "I'm so sorry – I didn't know –“

 "It’s alright, Jane. It happened a long time ago."

 "Yes, but she was your  _mother_."

 "She would have died eventually," Kyria said sadly, the words tasting no less bitter for being true. "She was only human."

 By the awkward shifting and the silently opening and closing mouth, it was clear Jane had no idea how to respond. "You must have seen a lot of people die," she said finally. "And this is a depressing conversation. Gabriel!"

 "Yes?" the archangel replied, showing up so quickly he might have flown.

 "Cheer her up while I call Darcy and my mom?" Jane half-asked, half-ordered.

 "Attempts at Cheering Charms are hit or miss with my darling niece, I'm afraid,” Gabriel announced, dismissing Kyria's strident protests that this  _wasn't necessary_. "But where cheering fails, distraction works wonders. Come on, Kyria, Fandral wishes to try his hand at charming you again."

 "Gabriel,  _no!"_  Kyria exclaimed, eyes wide.

 In retrospect, it was never a good idea to tell an archangel or trickster no.

 


	8. Courting Headaches

Jane had never had an audience with a king before. Or anyone more powerful and/or intimidating than the Director of SHIELD, and she had been part of a crowd and not subject to his sole attention at the time.

 Three people did not a crowd make. Unless they were all trying to squeeze in front of a computer monitor.  _Then_  three people made for a crowd. Because unless you were Tony Stark, computer monitors were not made big enough for multiple viewers. But her, Kyria, and Thor in standing before impressive-even-when-damaged throne? Nope, not a crowd.  _Maybe_  if Loki and Gabriel were there, but they skipped out on the pre-return to Earth (Midgard) audience.

 Probably because Odin seemed fixated on Kyria and Jane. One eye carried a lot of weight, even when split between two people! Maybe she could convince Fury to participate in a study to that affect?

 "I cannot give my blessing on a match between a Prince of the Realm and a mortal," Odin proclaimed.

 Outrage took over. "What?! Ow!" she yelped when Kyria drove an elbow into her ribs. Even through the slightly ridiculous form of Asgard clothing, Kyria's elbow was sharp.

 "A union between my son and a dignitary of another court could bear the makings of an advantageous alliance, however," the king continued as though there had been no interruption.

 Another sharp jab pre-empted Jane's protest. She glared at the half-human woman. Odin was trying to marry Thor off to someone else! Not that she had exclusive rights over the thunder god, much as she would like to, but this was the first she was hearing about any of this!

 "It is good then that Jane Foster is part of the court of the Morningstar," Kyria replied formally.

  _What_? "I am?" Confused gaping slowed her reaction time and she failed to evade a third elbow. She could take a hint though, especially one administered quite so painfully. "I am," Jane repeated, making it a declaration instead of a question this time. "Since when?" she hissed at Kyria. She managed to avoid the subsequent jab. "Stop that! I'm going to bruise!"

 "Not now!" Kyria quietly rebuked out of the side of her mouth, with a pointed look at the throne.

 Jane glared again. They were going to have  _words_  about this. Still, Odin was watching and probably listening to every word out of her mouth. Slightly intimidating father of her boyfriend. Something to pay attention to. Right. Stopping talking now. She smiled awkwardly.

 For the barest of instants, Odin almost looked amused. The expression vanished so quickly Jane thought she might have imagined it and the king was once again the visage of a hard, cold ruler.

 "Despite my initial reservations, Kyria the Morningstar has proven to be a valuable ally against a formidable foe. Asgard would do well to strengthen ties with Morningstar, Guardian of Midgard. Would the Morningstar find offense in a Prince of Asgard paying court to one of her subjects?"

 "Morningstar takes no offense when such courtship is welcome to both parties," Kyria answered. "Who is the Prince of Asgard who seeks relations with one of mine?"

 "My son and heir, Thor, the Thunderer."

 "Thor, son of Odin, son of Bor, of Asgard, who protected beneath the shadow of my wings do you desire leave to court?"

 "The Lady Jane Foster, a student of the stars, a woman whose beauty shines as bright as the stars and whose mind rivals them for their brilliance," Thor declared with a respectful bow to Kyria. Jane blushed profusely at the description.

 Kyria dipped her head in acknowledgement before turning to Jane. "And do you, Jane Foster, child of Midgard entrusted to my care, accept the attentions of the Thunderer, Prince of Asgard?"

 Jane ducked her head as her cheeks burned again. "Yes. I accept."

 "Does the Lady Morningstar accept this arrangement?" Odin asked.

 "So long as both remain in the courtship freely, without threat or coercion or ulterior purpose, I do."

 "Then it is that Thor of Asgard has entered a formal courtship. Let none try to sway his heart," the king intoned, striking the butt of his staff against the floor.

 As Jane tried to make sense of what just happened, Kyria took her by the elbow and steered her out of the throne room.

 "What just happened?" Jane demanded as soon as they cleared the doors.

 "I have been recognized as a formal ally of Asgard, with theoretical dominion of Earth," Kyria explained. 

 "The part about me and Thor!" she exclaimed.

 Kyria grinned. "Thor's dad just gave him permission to be your boyfriend."

 That's what she  _thought_ , but, "What happened to the whole ‘mortal’ meaning ‘bug’ thing?"

 The other woman's grin widened. "It's all in the details. Thor isn't dating a  _mortal_ , he's dating a subject of an allied court, headed by a power not inferior to Odin."

 "Huh?"

 "Semantics. I, as Morningstar, was dubbed the Midgard equivalent to Odin, lacking any other contenders. You, as a resident of Earth, are therefore one of my subjects. Moreover, you can be considered part of my 'court' because of our friendship, strengthened by my actions to release you from the Aether."

 "Really?" That sounded like stretching the truth. Although since it got her permission to date Thor – which she probably would have done regardless – she wasn't going to complain.

 Kyria made a face. "There might be some side effects."

 And there was the catch. "Side effects?" she said worriedly. There had been  _no mention_  of side effects! "Like I'm going to sprout wings, or my skin will turn red, or what?"

 "Nothing quite so extreme," Kyria said soothingly. "But you were exposed to a very powerful, very rare, previously unexplored energy. Very strong exposure. Then you got a dose of angelically based energy when I separated it from you. Typically, exposure to . . . unusual energies tend to be either benevolent or detrimental. If it's detrimental, you would know right away," she added quickly. " _I_  would know. But you're not dead, or dying, or developing cancer, or an Other Guy. Since you aren't, you won't. That's really how that sort of thing works. It doesn't sneak up on you."

 "Well, that's something at least." Not dying was always a good thing. Cancer probably wouldn't be good either. "What's an other guy?" she asked, confused.

 "The Hulk. Although technically, developing the Hulk kept Bruce from dying of gamma poisoning, so that one's a bit of a toss-up." Kyria shrugged. "I know too many people who could be classified as monsters to be bothered by the Hulk. I'm – well, NINJAT is – introducing Bruce to a number of them."

 "Oh. Right." Erik's friend. She knew that. She  _did_. She just didn't think it was important enough to remember. That's why she had Darcy. Darcy even got  _paid_ , enough to hire an intern apparently. But that wasn't the point. "I notice you've only mentioned what  _isn't_  going to happen to me."

 "Because that's easier." Kyria sighed. "Fury's been a dick about what happened to Phil. Claims he was recovering in Tahiti." She scoffed in contempt. "Please. Near as I can figure, Phil had a – a side effect. Possibly more than one. And Fury covered it up, and fixed it, and hid it from Phil, and me, and was an overall paranoid dick. I don't know what happened to Phil. I think I would have known if it was anything bad, but I have no frame of reference. Bela's the closest, but she's not really anything like what happened with Phil."

 Bela. That name was familiar. She knew this one. It was on the tip of her tongue. Oh, um, phone call, British accent. "Your secretary?"

 Kyria smirked briefly. "The phrase is 'personal assistant.' But yes."

 "What happened to your – personal assistant?"

 The smirk flared again before Kyria answered, "She sold her soul."

 "Sold her –  _oh my God._ ”

 "Yeah. And I bought the contract."

 Jane could not help but stare at the non-human government agent. Who shrugged. "I outrank every being in Hell. I wasn't lying, or even exaggerating, when I told Odin I could be on the throne in less than a day if I was so inclined. But, yeah, I ran into Bela, made a deal that I'd pull her contract if she came to work for me – and SHIELD. Obviously. But NINJAT was under my exclusive control even before it ceased to exist on the books. Regardless, soul selling and a lightning-bound hole in your chest are two very different things. Bela deciding her neighbor is a misogynistic asshole and using witchcraft to torment him into personally apologizing to half the women in the building would not be anything like what Phil experienced."

 It took a few tries to work moisture back into her mouth. "Witchcraft? That – that's a – thing?"

 "It typically involves making deals with demons and consigning your soul to Hell, but, again, I'm Bela's loophole. You probably fall somewhere in the middle. If I had to guess –"

 "I'd appreciate it."

 " – I’d say, maybe, increased longevity, faster healing, maybe higher endurance, higher tolerance to deprivation or extreme conditions, increased intellect. Those would be the most noticeable. Relatively speaking. I think only Darcy would be likely to notice if you went any longer without eating or sleeping than you already do. But you could have any, or all, or even none of them. I don't know."

 Jane blinked. "Oh. Okay. Those don't sound bad."

 Kyria smiled gently. "That's the point."

 With that, Jane pushed the concern aside, only making a mental note to run some tests on herself once she was back with her equipment.

 ***

 The Bifrost turned the four travelers returning to Midgard out in the darkened parking lot of the very same warehouse where Jane and her associates had been investigating the anomalies caused by the Convergence. 

 Kyria was very glad it was over. Her head could only take so much. The convergence, and the Aether, and Odin, and politics, and old memories, and becoming the designated ruler of Earth – Fury was going to have a  _field day_  and if the World Security Council ever got wind of that – she shuddered at the mere thought.

 Politics sucked. End of story. 

 Of course, bureaucratic paperwork also sucked and fed the political beast and she was up to her eyeballs in it. In order to stay  _out_  of politics, she needed to know  _about_  it, and really, it was a headache she didn't need on top of playing hide-and-seek with a demonic martyr and wrangling various disparate elements – namely, hunters and the beings they used to hunt – while trying to keep that side of things separate from the whole celebrity-superhero-headache. She really needed to do something about that before the house of cards collapsed. She was lucky it hadn’t in the year and a half since New York.

 She was also lucky that someone, presumably Gabriel – he had to be good for something – scrubbed the video footage from New York. Orion’s face was blurry because the Twins were good at what they did, but Orion’s wings didn’t exist. Not a feather, not a shadow in sight. As much as it pained them to admit it, the Tech Twins weren’t _that_ good. But what they failed to clear was gone from the images anyway, which was a blessed respite and meant her decision to use the Tesseract to save Stark wasn’t a complete fuck-up. If anyone had realized that Orion sprouted wings on the roof of Stark Tower, she wouldn’t even have had that year and a half grace period.  

 There was a reason she left Bobby nominally in charge of all things related to hunting and had Bela handling things on the SHIELD end. Delegation was a wonderful thing. And if some of the more hard-headed, narrow-minded SHIELD minions tended to suffer diarrhea, impotence, or indigestion more often than the norm, well, it was a lighter sentence than Gabriel would have handed down. She'd mentioned it to her uncle, who was surprisingly interested in a witch tied to nephilim rather than demons. The archangelic trickster even giddily agreed to give the budding witch some pointers. Kyria almost felt sorry for the assholes. 

 Almost.

"I suppose I should let Darcy, Erik, and, um, the intern, I forget his name – I should let them know I'm back," Jane said.  She reached down, then remembered her Asgard given garments didn't have pockets.

 "Donna had the same problem," Kyria noted, giving the scientist back her phone. "It might also be a good idea to warn them that Thor might be visiting in the near future. He'll be around more often, actually. Between the dating and the lack of war among the realms."

 Kyria heard it before she saw it, which wasn't that difficult because she was facing the wrong direction.

 "Um, I don't think that is supposed to be here," Jane said, as Kyria turned.

 An enormous creature with sharp teeth and claws and a giant spiked tail ran across the far end of the parking lot, chasing after a group of pigeons and knocking over a lamppost.

 "That is a Frost Beast of Jotunheim," Loki identified.

 "Must have caught a ride through the holes the convergence was tearing," Kyria mused.

 "Hey, Loki," Gabriel said, “you think Chuck would mind if we brought home a dog?"

 


	9. After Credits Scene

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Because Marvel movies have after credit scenes . . .

_Several hours earlier:_

 

"Messenger," a soft voice called.

 Gabriel turned a broad grin on the Asgardian Queen.  _She_  was the reason Odin was not an asshole of the highest order. Gabriel was well-versed in the douche-bags of the universe. The so-called All-Father was first class, tempered only by the steely determination of his supposedly mild-mannered wife. Kudos to her.

 "Frigga," he greeted warmly. It wasn't the  _queen_  Gabriel had any issues with. Well, not many.  _She_  had done reasonably well by Loki, teaching him magic when it became apparent he had the ability. She didn't do so well teaching him self-esteem or how to play well with others, but then he'd already noted that Odin was an ass, hadn't he? Besides, if she had, Gabriel would have nothing to teach the poor little Jotun fosterling. He'd never had a protégé – not counting Kyria – and it was surprisingly fun, if smacking of more responsibility than he normally cared to admit to. "What can I do for you?"

 "Continue taking care of my son, for one thing," she answered with a gentle smile. "I deeply appreciate you helping him where I could not."

 "I know all about bad parenting," Gabriel announced, snapping up a lollipop, more for familiarity than for the sugar, "but I wouldn't consider you one."

 "Thank you for that sentiment," she said with a nod. 

 "You said one thing," he prompted when she appeared lost in thought. When two as-good-as-immortals got lost in thought, it could literally be _ages_ before they got anywhere.

 "Yes, I did." Frigga produced an intricate dark metal container that glowed red. "I want you to take this."

 It took a lot to surprise an archangel, but Gabriel blinked. "That's the Aether."

 "With the Tesseract here in Asgard, it would be unwise to keep this as well. It is dangerous to keep two Infinity Stones so close together."

 "Okay. Why give it to me?” Gabriel wasn’t exactly known for playing well with others (see his flight from Heaven and his rather oversized list of pissed-off pagans for references) or using care when handling toys (consider the line of dead, maimed, and traumatized assholes he left scattered in his wake. Not sorry). “I can see not handing it off to Loki,” saving the King or not, the kid and Odin had a frosty – snicker – relationship, “but why not Kyria?" Since, really, she was the obvious choice.

 "She doesn't need it yet."

 Right. Seer. Sort of like Chuck. But not. There weren’t many proper seer types on Earth these days. Not many in days past either, actually. "Yet?"

 "Maybe not ever," the queen amended. "I cannot be sure. I only know that her part in this is far from over and she will need all the help she can get before the end."

 "Alrighty then." Gabriel accepted the ominously glowing container and tucked it away into a pocket dimension only he could reach.

 "Thank you," Frigga said softly, before issuing a final parting comment of, "Good luck."

 


End file.
